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Lie With Me
Philippe Besson
The award-winning, bestselling French novel by Philippe Besson about an affair between two teenage boys in 1984 France, translated with subtle beauty and haunting lyricism by the iconic and internationally acclaimed actress/writer Molly Ringwald.
We drive at high speed along back roads, through woods, vineyards, and oat fields. The bike smells like gasoline and makes a lot of noise, and sometimes I’m frightened when the wheels slip on the gravel on the dirt road, but the only thing that matters is that I’m holding on to him, that I’m holding on to him outside.
Just outside a hotel in Bordeaux, Philippe chances upon a young man who bears a striking resemblance to his first love. What follows is a look back at the relationship he’s never forgotten, a hidden affair with a gorgeous boy named Thomas during their last year of high school. Without ever acknowledging they know each other in the halls, they steal time to meet in secret, carrying on a passionate, world-altering affair.
Dazzlingly rendered in English by Ringwald in her first-ever translation, Besson’s powerfully moving coming-of-age story captures the eroticism and tenderness of first love—and the heartbreaking passage of time.
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Clover
“There is the insanity of not being able to be seen together. An insanity that is aggravated in this case by the unprecedented situation of finding ourselves in the middle of a crowd and having to act like strangers. It seems crazy not to be able to show our happiness. Such an impoverished word. Others have this right, and they exercise it freely. Sharing their happiness makes them even more happy, makes them expand with joy. But we’re left stunted, compromised, by the burden of having to always lie and censor ourselves. This passion that can’t be talked about, that has to be concealed, gives way to the terrible question: if it isn’t talked about, how can one know that it really exists? One day, when it’s over, when it finally comes to an end, no one will be able to attest to what took place”
▸ I re-read this book yearly for about four years now. It is genuinely one of my favorite books in the world. It’s about a tale of two gay lovers that began and ended in the 1980s. Many years later, Philippe meets his lover’s son. The way Besson writes this tragedy genuinely breaks my heart. As a sapphic, I understand the world of having to hide a lover, but this book pains me even more knowing they come from a time that this love would have not been allowed. The characters are named after real people, Besson and his lover Thomas Andrieu. The stories perhaps have a bit of truth in them, or maybe more than a bit. It’s heartbreaking and raw and genuinely thought-provoking. Lie With Me is a masterclass in yearning with the understanding that it truly cannot be.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
5 / 5
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