April in Paris
A Novel
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- 19,99 €
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- 19,99 €
Publisher Description
A transatlantic novel for fans of A.S. Byatt and Don DeLillo.
Shaun is an American professor enjoying his sabbatical—and his substantial inheritance—in Paris, until one night when he is startled awake by a nightmare. His attempts to decipher the dream lead him to a New York murder trial that occurred in 1916 in the Bronx.
Upon discovering that the murder took place in the basement of his father's childhood apartment building and having no recollection of being told about it in his boyhood, Shaun explores the possibility of a repressed memory. His amateur, but psychologically astute, investigation coincides with the beginning of his first serious romance since the death of his wife five years earlier. By the time he uncovers the shocking truth behind the case, he has traveled to Spain, New York, Sweden, and back to France.
While deciphering a murder that hits close to home, John J. Healey offers an intimate tale of love, family, and the complexities of the human heart.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
American art historian Shaun, the protagonist of this pallid mystery from Healey (The Samurai's Daughter), is on sabbatical in Paris when through mutual friends he meets Carmen, a microbiologist who teaches at MIT. The two are attracted to each other, and Shaun confides in Carmen about a haunting dream in which he's a young girl who uses scissors to cut wires binding her legs before fleeing Shaun's grandfather's Bronx house. The scissors remind Shaun of his childhood barbershop, and googling it yields the transcript of the 1916 trial of Eugene MacBride, charged with raping and strangling 11-year-old Ingrid Anderson, a neighbor of Shaun's family. After Shaun realizes that Anderson resembles the girl from his dream, he investigates. Unfortunately, the transcript excerpts consist of narrative paragraphs that seem like formal written witness statements rather than actual testimony, and uneven prose ("It was as if all of our banter up until then... fell away like scaffolding, like the cracked shell of an egg, broken by the force of an instinct unwilling to remain hidden any longer") is another minus. Healey unsuccessfully combines a cold case with romance.
