Éliette Abecassis has written around twenty works.
JOEL SAGET / AFP
Foreign novel. For his second novel after the remarkable “Ghosts of the Old Country”, the American Nathan Hill also looks at the couple. In “Well-being” (ed. Gallimard, 688 p., €26), he dissects with great mastery and obvious know-how, the journey of a man and a woman trapped in routine through the years . Read more.
Gallimard
Dark novel. This first thriller translated from Arabic by Algerian author Amara Lakhous, “The Fertility of Evil” (ed. Actes Sud, 288 p., €22.50) immerses us in an investigation into the fallout of terrorism in a country which hides behind a 2005 Charter to prevent any criticism of the regime. Score-settling and corruption behind the scenes of Algerian political life. Read more.
South Acts
Amara Lakhous moved first to Italy then to the United States where he is a professor at Yale University.
Roman Italy. In “Irina Nikolaevna” (ed. Liana Levi, 272 p., €22) Paola Capriolo wonderfully captures the brilliant and coded atmosphere of the Italian seaside resort of San Remo, during the Belle Époque. We follow Lady Brown, the widow of a baronet, who hires a lively young lady, Irina, as a lady-in-waiting. Read more.
Colored test. “Rose, History of a Color” is the seventh book in a series begun nearly twenty-five years ago, on the history of colors in European societies, from Roman Antiquity to the end of the XVIIIe century. The first six volumes were devoted to blue, black, green, red, yellow, white. Michel Pastoureau, known worldwide for his work, unveils his first work dedicated to a secondary color, pink, both unloved and iconic. An exciting quest. Read more.
Éditions Seuil, 192 p., €39.90.
Icelandic author. The Icelandic poet and novelist Jón Kalman Stefánsson is one of the guests of the Lettres du monde festival which runs until November 26. In our interview, he discusses his latest novel “My Yellow Submarine” (ed. Christian Bourgois, 408 p., €22), where it is about the Beatles, Paul McCartney in the lead, and the initiatory journey into the imagination of a child who became a man. Read more.
Accurate. The philosopher Frédéric Schiffter, based in the Basque Country, publishes a perfidious and caustic little work, joyfully illustrated by Muzo, on the world of business, its ridiculous jargon and its oppressive code. Its title? “Essential statement of hatred of work” (ed. Le Dilettante, 128 p., €16). Read more.
