XCiTés – The Flamingo Book of New French writing
Georgia de Chamberet (ed.)
Contributors: Frédéric Beigbeder, Tonino Benacquista, Marcel Desailly, Agnès Desarthe, Virginie Despentes, Marie Desplechin, Ilan Duran Cohen, Michel Houellebecq, Mathieu Kassovitz, Mounsi, Abdourahman Waberi & others.Translators: Boris Belay, Steve Cox, Michael Dash, Christine Donougher, Paul Hammond, Will Hobson, Ruth McConnel,William Rodarmor, Brad Rumph, Ros Schwartz.
STRAIGHT NO CHASER – The perfect Eurostar read.
INDEPENDENT – French society is diverse, richly multi-cultural, and the writing in this collection represents some of that diversity. If a writer is clearly wonderful — Waberi (originally from Djibouti) or Mounsi (Algerian) — then we want more. The last three inclusions — scenes from Mathieu Kassovitz's film La Haine, a piece on the house music scene by DJ Tov and an interview with Chelsea defender Marcel Desailly — illustrate the point of this kind of new fiction which is to question traditional modes of publishing. The French are tired of their image.
THE FACE – A collection of short stories by French writers exposing their country as a hotbed of sexual adventure, racial tension and club bedlam. Frédéric Beigbeder's Trashed sees lives saved in a chic Parisian club; Virginie Despentes screws bald men in Fuck Me and in Haiku Marie Desplechin exposes phoney liberalism on a blind date with a black man. Extracts from Michel Houellebecq's novel Whatever and the screenplay to La Haine lend gritty gravitas.
SUNDAY GLASGOW HERALD – French writing in translation by a new generation which aims to smash the sterotypes.
HarperCollins | Trade PB July 1999 | buy now | 288 pp GBP 14.99 | 978-0002259392 | PB March 2000 | buy now | 288 pp GBP 6.99 | 978-0006551911 | Literature & Fiction, Short Stories & Anthologies