Suite Francaise: Vintage 21

Editorial Reviews

"Deftly translated by Sandra Smith, this is possibly the most devastating indictment of French manners and morals since Madame Bovary, as hypnotic as Proust at the biscuit tin, as gruelling as Genet on the prowl. Irène Nemirovsky is, on this evidence, a novelist of the very first order, perceptive to a fault and sly in her emotional restraint" - Evening Standard

"Remarkable as the story of the publication of Suite Française is, it will finally be of anecdotal interest compared with the importance of the book. Here is the work of a fine novelist at the top of her form, writing about the fate of her adopted country with a pitiless clarity" - Patrick Marnham

"[I]t is certain to be the toast of publisher...evokes the heroism, brutality and cowardice of a country under occupation...critics are united in acclaiming it as one of the most important novels about the occupation" - Sunday Times

"Suite Francaise is one of those rare books that demands to be read" - Helen Dunmore, Guardian

"A book of exceptional literary quality, it has the kind of intimacy found in the diary of Anne Frank" - Times Literary Supplement

"An heroic attempt to write a novel about a nightmare in which the author is entirely embedded" - Anita Brookner, Spectator

"An irresistible work. Suite Francaise clutches the heart" - Carmen Callil, The Times

"It is quite outstanding, full of beauty, pain and truth...We are lucky to have this book" - Anne Chisholm, Sunday Telegraph

"Nemirovsky has a great gift for describing the ordinariness that surrounds catastrophes... it is this ability to conjure up people, in all their moods and foibles, their selflessness or vanity, that makes Suite Francaise so remarkable" - Literary Review

"What is to me most remarkable is the degree to which Nemirovsky, writing so close to the event, has nevertheless distilled it to extract the significance of each moment and episode. it is literature, not journalism... Her novel is in the classic French tradition, intelligent and sensuous" - Scotsman