A language learners’ forum

Recently the International Booker Prize's longlist was announced. 3 of the 13 books were translated from the French:

Laurent Mauvignier - Histoires de la nuit
Maryse Condé - L'Évangile du nouveau monde
Gauz - Debout-paye

The Stockholm library has all three of them. I borrowed the first two and put a hold on the third one.
I guess I won't read Mauvignier's book. While the premise sounds quite good, it's a chunker of 600+ pages and the first sentence ends half-way down the second page . I don't think that my French is up to that, and as the library doesn't have any (for me) readable translation and I don't want to buy one, parallel reading is not an option.
Condé's book is much shorter (280 pages), and there is a Swedish translation, so I'll give it a try as soon as I've finished Dumas' Monte-Cristo. I've read several of Condé's books in translation and liked them, so I guess I'll like even this one.

One thing I definitely don't read is books where

the first sentence ends half-way down the second page .

Maybe that is why I had trouble with Proust....

Carmody wrote:One thing I definitely don't read is books where

the first sentence ends half-way down the second page .

Maybe that is why I had trouble with Proust....

Actually, I think Proust ended his first sentence somewhere on page 4 ...

Book Review Part II of La petite fille de Monsieur Linh by Philippe Claudel

It is always on my second reading that I get so very much out of a book.

This is one very special book that I can not say enough about and do not want to talk too much about for fear of spoiling it for readers. Suffice to say that it is a short beautifully crafted book that many will ignore and I am so lucky to have been given by a neighbor.

I confess one of the joys of the book was that it did not require lots of look ups in the dictionary. It is simply written with a slow pacing and lovely ending that I had not expected. I believe it can be read by readers of all ages and is definitely something to savor.

Not all French 20th century fiction authors are on a downer and this author proves it.

B1/B2
8/10

Carmody wrote:Book Review Part II of La petite fille de Monsieur Linh by Philippe Claudel

Thank you for this recommendation. I looked it up on Amazon and as the kindle edition was just £1.49 I bought it immediately. I intend to pick this up when I finish my current read (an even shorter book: Le Petit Nicolas, c'est Noël!).

Silly question, but how many pages is the actual book? Looking on different listings about the book I'm getting wildly different page numbering.

jeffers
the actual book

is 184 pages.

I think it is a special book that deserves to be read slowly, which is how I read anyway.

Please tell me what you think of it when finished.

I admire you learning Sanskrit; I have always wanted to but will have to save that for another reincarnation.