Wide Awake: A Novel

(Paperback)

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Description

Coming of age in 1960s Paris, Bernard Applebaum exists in the hazy shadow of the Holocaust and on the electric cusp of the French New Wave. The narrator of Wide Awake can be found as he wanders the city streets in search of signs of his father, who was deported by the Nazis in 1942. Bernard's chance encounter with a former acquaintance who has become filmmaker Francois Truffaut's assistant leads to a spot as an extra on the set of Jules and Jim - setting into motion a series of discoveries and lost memories that crack open a hidden past.

Reviews

An exhortation to savor the small momentary joys . . . to capture fleeting moments.
Le Monde des Livres

Ventriloquist of writing, Bober speaks in several voices, and captivates in every range.
Tlrama

Recreates an era and a Paris that has completely disappeared.
Livres Hebdo

A story of desire told with reserve and intensity.
La Quinzaine litrraire

Bober weaves his own memory into the collective memory.
La Croix

Author Bio

Born in 1931 in Berlin, Robert Bober is a film and stage director and writer. He has directed over 120 films for television and is the author of five books, including Ellis Island (The New Press) with Georges Perec and Quoi de neuf sur la guerre, for which he was awarded the Prix du Livre Inter. Bober lives in Paris. Carol Volk has translated over three dozen titles from the French. Her work has appeared in the New Yorker and other literary publications. She has spent the last decade in the U.S. Foreign Service and currently lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland.