Climates

An international bestseller with more than one million copies sold: the French classic of obsession, jealousy, and the fragile architectures of love.

When Climates was first published in 1928, it became an immediate sensation across Europe, selling out its initial 100,000-copy Russian print run on the day it hit Moscow bookstores.

At its center is Philippe Marcenat, whose idolization of his beautiful first wife, Odile, rapidly devolves into destructive paranoia. After their marriage collapses, Philippe marries the constant, patient Isabelle—only to inflict upon her the very emotional torment he himself endured.

Told in two brilliantly mirrored confessions, André Maurois’s landmark novel is a sharp, haunting dissection of a double conjugal failure—exploring the invisible temperaments, family patterns, and quiet insecurities that govern who we love and how we destroy them.

Imbued with psychological insights of a caliber rivaling Tolstoy, Climates is perfect for readers of Marcel Proust, and Stefan Zweig.