Author: Sebastien Japrisot
Translator: Minjung Kim
Publisher: Munhaksegyesa
368 pages.
| Important! Please read before you order! |
| >>>This book is written in Korean only. |
About This Book
January 1917: five French soldiers are marched to their own front lines where
they will be tossed out into no man's land with their hands tied behind their
backs and left for the Germans to shoot. They were, in civilian life, variously
a pimp, a mechanic, a farmer, a carpenter, and a fisherman; now they are
condemned because each had sought to leave the war by shooting himself in the
hand. Taken to a godforsaken trench nicknamed Bingo Crépuscule, the five are
reluctantly sent out into the darkness; days later, five bodies are recovered
and the families are notified, merely, that the men died in the line of duty.
August 1919: Mathilde Donnay receives a letter from a dying man. In it, the
former soldier tells her that he met her beloved fiancé, the fisherman Manech,
shortly before he died. Mathilde goes to meet Sergeant Daniel Esperanza at his
hospital and there hears the story of the execution. She also receives a package
with a photograph of the men and copies of their last letters. As Mathilde reads
and rereads the letters and goes over Esperanza's tale, she begins to suspect
that perhaps the story didn't end quite so neatly. And so begins her very long
investigation into the mysterious circumstances surrounding the deaths of five
condemned prisoners--one of whom, at least, might not really be dead.
In Mathilde Donnay, Sebastien Japrisot has created one of the most compelling
and delightful heroines in modern fiction. Though confined to a wheelchair since
childhood, "Mathilde has other lives, varied and quite beautiful ones." She
paints, cares for her pets, enjoys a rich fantasy life, and is relentless in her
search for the truth about Manech's death. But she is by no means the only
vibrant personality leaping off Japrisot's pages. This author has a remarkable
ability to draw even minor characters in three dimensions with economy and wit.
Take Mathilde's mother, for instance, caught in mid-card game: "At bridge,
manille, bezique, Mama is a dirty rotten swine. Not only is she an ace with the
pasteboards, but she throws her opponents off their mettle by insulting or
making fun of them." And even the characters we meet only through other people's
memories--the condemned men--are so fully realized that you find yourself torn
over which one you hope may have survived. As Mathilde comes ever closer to
solving the mystery of what happened at Bingo Crépuscule that January morning in
1917, Sebastien Japrisot proves himself a master storyteller and A Very Long
Engagement a near perfect novel. --Alix Wilber
Availability: Usually ships in 5~10 business days.
 | |||||||||
 |
| ||||||||
Can't
find what you're looking for?
