cover image The Devil’s Reward

The Devil’s Reward

Emmanuelle de Villepin, trans. from the French by C. Jon Delogu. Other Press, $16.95 trade paper (256p) ISBN 978-1-59051-868-7

De Villepin’s flawed English-language debut begins when 86-year-old Christiane, widowed and living alone in Paris, receives a distraught call from her daughter, Catherine, in Milan. Catherine confesses to her mother that her husband is having yet another affair. Christiane, slightly amused at her daughter’s histrionics, invites Catherine and her daughter Luna to come to Paris, delighted at the prospect of their company in her lonely house. When Luna reveals that she is writing a thesis on Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner, Christiane claims to know all about him. Though Catherine expresses skepticism about the veracity of her mother’s memories, the older woman launches in and out of a lively, possibly unreliable, story of her father, Papyrus, his brothers, her elegant Aunt Bette, and their involvement with Steiner over the course of the two world wars. There is much discussion of Steiner’s idiosyncratic philosophies, but the strength and charm of this author’s story—of bonding and healing among three generations of women reveling in their shared history—is obscured by an overwrought translation: “my mother held a handkerchief over her face to prevent any grains of dust from fouling her mouth, which was about to receive the body of Christ. Since we were still laughing, she complained and ordered us to close our mouths with the aim of a similar Christian hygiene.” Though the premise is intriguing, the prose keeps readers at arm’s length. [em](May) [/em]