Connemara
A Novel
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
A breathtaking story of unfulfilled dreams, unexpected second chances, and love in a present-day France turning against itself, from the Goncourt Prize–winning author of And Their Children After Them.
Hélène is approaching 40. Born in a small town in the east of France, she worked hard to leave it behind and achieve a life worthy of the glossy magazines she pored over as a teen. But now that she seemingly has it all—a husband and two daughters, a successful career, and a custom-designed house near Nancy—she feels unfulfilled, as though the years have passed her by.
Christophe just turned 40 and has never left his little corner of France, where he grew up with Hélène. No longer as handsome as he used to be, he’s led an unassuming life, preferring to party with friends than to apply himself. These days, he’s selling dog food, dreaming of playing hockey again like he did when he was 16, and living with his father and son—a quiet, indecisive existence, which could be seen as failure. And yet he fully believes that anything is still possible.
Through the story of how their two disparate lives intersect once more, Connemara beautifully evokes the complex pain and joy of returning to your roots, and trying to make a relationship last in a rapidly changing, increasingly divided country.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A French woman's midlife crisis sets her off on a quest to recover the spirit of her youth in this pulsing novel of desire from Mathieu (And Their Children After Them). On the eve of her 40th birthday, Hélène, a wife and the mother of two daughters, finds herself nostalgic for the "vanished period" of her young adulthood. Despite a successful career, healthy children, and a handsome husband, she equates getting older to feeling like "something had been stolen from her." Mathieu then jumps ahead five years, with Hélène suffering from burnout at work as her midlife crisis continues, prompting her to uproot her family from Paris and retreat to the part of northern France where she grew up. There, she embarks on an extramarital affair with Christophe, a former high school flame. Recently divorced, Christophe has dashed dreams of his own; his onetime aspirations of becoming a pro hockey player have vanished along with his hopes of keeping his marriage together. Vivid flashback sequences fill in the complicated histories of Hélène and Christophe: their accumulated disappointments, jealousies, betrayals, and hard-earned lessons. Mathieu makes life's emotional precariousness and fading glory palpable.
