The Girl You Call: A Novel

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

In this shrewd, timely novel with the allure of old-school noir, an aging boxer and his daughter fight back against political corruption and sexual abuse. At 40, the great boxer Max Le Corre was enjoying a renaissance, back at the top of the ticket after a long absence. When he wasn't in the ring, he worked as a driver for the mayor, Quentin Le Bars. Above all, he was a father to Laura, his 20-year-old daughter who recently returned home after trying her hand at modeling. Quentin had helped Max when he was down on his luck, a seemingly washed-up fighter, and now Max hoped he would help Laura find her bearings in town. But Laura's meeting with Quentin reveals a darker side to the politician, setting in motion a chain of events that will pit Max against his benefactor. With deceptively simple, evocative prose, Tanguy Viel has crafted a brilliant takedown of the power imbalances that allow #MeToo situations to occur and fester.

Reviews

Praise for Article 353:

Sharp and memorablea dark fable that reads like one of Georges Simenons romans durs or psychological novels, which winningly fuse together lean prose, queasy atmospherics, raw emotion, and moral conundrums[Viel] satisfies with a potent concoction of mystery, complexity, and tightly coiled tension.Minneapolis Star Tribune

[A] beguiling noirArresting metaphors enliven the spare proseViel should win new American fans with this elegant effort.Publishers Weekly

Author Bio

Tanguy Viel was born in Brest in 1973. He is the author of several novels, including The Absolute Perfection of Crime (winner of the Prix Feneon and the Prix litteraire de la vocation), Beyond Suspicion, The Disappearance of Jim Sullivan, and Article 353 (Other Press, 2019), which won the Grand prix RTL Lire and the Prix Fran ois-Mauriac de la region Aquitaine. He lives near Orleans, France. William Rodarmor has translated some forty-five books and screenplays in genres ranging from literary fiction to espionage and fantasy. His recent translations include Tanguy Viel's Article 353 and Nicolas Mathieu's And Their Children After Them, for which he won the 2021 Albertine Prize. He lives in Berkeley, California.