The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Marguerite Yourcenar's 1939 novel, Coup de Grâce.
I note with some amusement that the Farrar, Straus and Giroux publicity page offers as the book description a slightly pared-down version of the back-cover copy:
Note that in his review of a biography of Yourcenar in The New York Times Book Review Edmund White suggests it is: "perhaps her strongest piece of fiction" -- and that: "The title also alludes to her meeting Grace Frick" (who translated the book into English -- and was Yourcenar's longtime partner).
I note with some amusement that the Farrar, Straus and Giroux publicity page offers as the book description a slightly pared-down version of the back-cover copy:
Set in the Baltic provinces in the aftermath of World War I, Coup de Grace tells the story of an intimacy that grows between three young people hemmed in by civil war: Erick, a Prussian fighting with the White Russians against the Bolsheviks; Conrad, his best friend from childhood; and Sophie, whose unrequited love for Conrad becomes an unbearable burden.This sounds like an even more fun version of the book -- since Conrad is Sophie's brother (and, yes, the one thing the book is missing is a good dose of incest ...). (They copied it wrong from the back cover: it is of course Erick that Sophie pines for.)
Note that in his review of a biography of Yourcenar in The New York Times Book Review Edmund White suggests it is: "perhaps her strongest piece of fiction" -- and that: "The title also alludes to her meeting Grace Frick" (who translated the book into English -- and was Yourcenar's longtime partner).