First Blood

by Amélie Nothomb, Alison Anderson (Translator)

Overview

WINNER OF THE 2021 RENAUDOT PRIZE
WINNER OF THE 2022 STREGA EUROPEAN PRIZE
A WORLD LITERATURE TODAY NOTABLE BOOK 2023

A moving fictionalized account of Nothomb’s own father, who died of Covid related symptoms in early 2020, this is the acclaimed author’s most personal and heartfelt novel.

The Republic of the Congo, 1964. A young man faces a firing squad, preparing for his last moment on Earth. He is known as a complex and complicated man whose childhood left him hungry for affection and attention and who transformed his emotional wounds into a brilliant career as a diplomat and a negotiator. Now he finds himself negotiating for his own life, together with the lives of 1,500 Congolese citizens.

Inspired by the life of her father and by her lifelong effort to understand him, Amélie Nothomb’s new novel is about life-and-death decisions, about reckoning with one’s past, reconciling with one’s parents, and about the hard, often humorous work of determining one’s own path.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781609458447
Publisher:	Europa Editions, Incorporated
Publication date:	05/02/2023
Pages:	112
Sales rank:	1,036,292
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Amélie Nothomb was born in Japan to Belgian parents in 1967. She lives in Paris. Her books have been translated into twenty-five languages and counting, and have been awarded numerous prizes including the French Academy’s Grand Prix for the Novel, the René-Fallet, Alain-Fournier, and Jean-Giono prizes. 

Alison Anderson spent many years in California; she now lives in a Swiss village and works as a literary translator. Her translations include The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery and works by Nobel laureate J. M. G. Le Clézio. She has also written two novels and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Literary Translation Fellowship.

Editorial Reviews

First Blood... tells an effortless story, offering much that can be enjoyed...Like 100 Years of Solitude, the novel opens with a man facing a firing squad...Eight months on, his life was forever affected by the death of his father and his mother’s decision to let her parents raise him.”—Declan O'Driscoll, The Irish Times 

“First Blood is funny and engaging, the narrative voice appealing, the writing vivid and clever.”—Frenchly

“Nothomb's crystalline re-remembrance is a spellcasting, one-sitting read that's Technicolor vivid and rich in joy, humor, and love.”—Booklist

“This book is a gem.”—Le Parisien 

“Amélie Nothomb at her best: cruel, tender and funny.”—Télérama 

 “A book bubbling in delightful humor and exuberant vitality.”—Le Figaro 

From the Publisher