Review by Booklist Review
The author of the best-selling WWII-era novel Sarah's Key (2007) offers up an equally emotional contemporary tale of a family in turmoil. Linden Malegarde has returned to Paris for his father's seventieth birthday celebration. But when Linden arrives, no one and nothing is festive. His father, Paul, seems withdrawn; his mother, Lauren, is ill; and his older sister, Tilia, is on edge. To make matters worse, the Seine is on the verge of flooding due to heavy, unrelenting rain. And then Paul has a massive stroke, forcing Linden to fully confront his complicated feelings about his family and their feelings about his sexuality. The Malegardes are so beset by tragedy Tilia is still haunted by the car accident years ago that she alone survived while her friends perished, and Linden's aunt died under heartbreaking circumstances that their sorrow threatens to overwhelm the story even more than the dire flood waters besieging Paris. De Rosnay's many fans, and all who embrace tearful tales, will enjoy the slow unraveling of the complex troubles and secrets of the Malegarde family.--Kristine Huntley Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The triumphant 11th novel from de Rosnay (Sarah's Key) follows the unraveling of long pent-up frustrations within the Malegarde family against the backdrop of a natural disaster. Linden Malegarde, a Franco-American photographer, travels to Paris to celebrate the 70th birthday of his father, Paul. But when Paul suffers a stroke and is hospitalized, Linden decides to stay indefinitely. As Paul's health ebbs, the river Seine floods the city, relentlessly rising due to driving rain. For Linden, the Paris he knows so well becomes "hardly identifiable, yet painfully familiar," paralleling his own feelings and memories of his adolescence. Fearing more of the rejection and bigotry he's experienced throughout his life, Linden, who is in his late 30s, has yet to come out as gay to his father or introduce him to his longtime partner, Sacha. During the days of unexpectedly close quarters with his father, mother, and sister, Linden begins to open up and discovers that each family member has secrets and emotional wounds just as intense as his own. Throughout, de Rosnay stokes the Malegardes' histories with raw and powerful reminisces and gorgeous descriptions. This is an emotional tour de force and a thoughtful, deliberate examination of personal tragedy and the possibility of redemption. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A novel of Paris, family secrets, and catastrophic weather, from Franco-British author de Rosnay.In Paris, the severity of flooding is traditionally measured by how close the waters of the Seine come to submerging the statue of a colonial soldier near the Pont de l'Alma. In de Rosnay's (Manderley Forever, 2017, etc.) latest novel, the river rises to the statue's waist and beyond, disrupting the weekend plans of the Malegarde family. Paul, an eminent arborist; his wife, Lauren, an American who toured Europe in the 1970s with her sister, Candice, and never left; their son, Linden, a world-renowned photographer; and daughter, Tilia, a not-so-renowned painter, meet at a hotel to celebrate Paul's 70th birthday. Rain has been unusually constant even for January (presumably 2018). Linden, whose perspective dominates, is genteelly estranged from his parents and sister. His mother could never accept his gayness, which is why he left his father's ancestral village to spend his adolescence living with Tante Candice in her 15th arrondissement apartment. Paul always reserved his most fervent emotions for trees. He suffers a stroke at his birthday dinner and is hospitalized. In view of his saintliness, it seems excessive for de Rosnay to silence him this way, with occasional cryptic diary entries and a baffling obsession with David Bowie as the only clues to his character. The family reunion is further complicated when Lauren develops pneumonia, the trauma underlying Tilia's hospital phobia surfaces, her drunken husband comes to town, and the tragedy of Candice's last days is revealed. The evocation of Paris is worthy of Modiano, and de Rosnay's projection of the city's worst deluge since 1910 is not only horrifying, but timely after the actual Seine floods of January 2018. However, the novel is long on rumination and summary, short on dialogue and forward momentum. The timing of the personal revelations seems arbitrary or, at best, anticlimactic.The weather and Paris are the main attractions here, not the people. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
