This novel of a woman without hope but who remains optimistic is filled with self-examination, self-recrimination and self-actualization. In spite of a life that becomes, more and more evidently, one in which she has no firm place, Veronique maintains an outlook that is remarkably sunny. She accepts with a fatalist attitude that she may never find happiness but can find contentment. She murders a man she thinks is her father, becomes a fugitive in her native Guinea, embarks on a life of petty crime and eventually becomes the wife of a man who is paralyzed by an intruder with a gun. She has become an attendant to her own fate.

Written in the form of dialogues with an equally enigmatic figure whose frustration infects Veronique nearly to the point of madness, this tough narrative is nonetheless sprinkled with the rainfall of luck; sometimes good, sometimes bad. Set in Paris and Guinea under the rule of a brutal dictator whose murderous methods threaten nearly everyone, political opponent or not, this is not an easy or happy story. Still, it is filled with inspiration, as one woman fights endlessly to make a life with some satisfaction in it. While she submits herself to her fate she recognizes that much of what we are can be attributed to who we are and what we do. Here is a passage that demonstrates the self-awareness of the evils of the world. Camp B is a political prison.

“We’re disarmingly stupid and hateful. And when evil is done, when blood and tears spill over everywhere, we pour out prayers and speeches. There we are, in front of churches and mosques protest signs brandished: NEVER AGAIN! The slogan is firm in our mouths. But our minds aren’t fooled: two, three, four, five years, ten max, and Camp B will have spawned little ones in Tibet, in the Yucatan, in Bechuanaland; Sobibor, its grandbabies in Peru, Siberia, Botswana. And again, prayers and speeches. Again, stirred-up sensitive souls and protest signs over the heads of the outraged. And no one will think to lift up a mirror: “Look, open your eyes. What devils? What monsters? It’s only you and me. Leave the devils alone!”

A gritty and uncompromising book, this points out the dichotomy between abandoning ourselves to fate and creating our own. It shows the difficulties present in living life. The author is an award-winner and the translator is skillful in fulfilling the meaning of the writing. Excellently done in all aspects.