C'Est La Vie: Shocking, Hilarious and Poignant Noir
A writer finds fame and misfortune after winning a big literary prize and embarking on a roadtrip with his son in this novel by the 'slyly funny' [Sunday Times] Pascal Garnier.
'A jeu d'esprit of hard-boiled symbolism' Wall Street Journal
Writer Jeff Colombier is not accustomed to success. Twice divorced with a grown-up son he barely sees, he drinks too much and his books don't sell.
Then he wins a big literary prize and his life changes for ever. Overwhelmed by his newfound wealth and happiness, he feels the need to escape and recapture his lost youth, taking his son, Damien, with him. And if shady lawyers and mysterious girls lead them down dangerous paths . . . well, c'est la vie.
Earn by promoting books
Earn money by sharing your favorite books through our Affiliate program.
Become an affiliate
Pascal Garnier, who died in March 2010, was a talented novelist, short story writer, children's author and painter. From his home in the mountains of the Ardèche, he wrote fiction in a noir palette with a cast of characters drawn from ordinary provincial life. Though his writing is often very dark in tone, it sparkles with quirkily beautiful imagery and dry wit. Garnier's work has been likened to the great thriller writer, Georges Simenon.
Jane Aitken is a publisher and translator from the French.
Praise for Pascal Garnier
'Deliciously dark ... painfully funny' Marilyn Stasio, New York Times
'Brief, brisk, ruthlessly entertaining ... Garnier makes bleakness pleasurable' John Powers, NPR
'Wonderful ... properly noir' Ian Rankin
'Horribly funny ... appalling and bracing in equal measure' John Banville
'Garnier plunges you into a bizarre, overheated world, seething death, writing, fictions and philosophy. He's a trippy, sleazy, sly and classy read.' A. L. Kennedy
'The final descent into violence is worthy of J G Ballard. 4 stars' The Independent
'Combines a sense of the surreal with a ruthless wit.' The Observer
'Reminiscent of Joe Orton and the more impish films of Alfred Hitchcock and Claude Chabrol' Sunday Times
'Tense, strange, disconcerting and slyly funny' Sunday Times
'A brilliant exercise in grim and gripping irony, it makes you grin as well as wince' Sunday Telegraph
'The combination of sudden violence, surreal touches and bone-dry humour have led to Garnier's work being compared with the films of Tarantino and the Coen brothers' Sunday Times
'A mixture of Albert Camus and JG Ballard' Financial Times
'Bleak, often funny and never predictable' The Observer
'Combines a sense of the surreal with a ruthless wit.' The Observer
Featured in The Independent's 'Crème de la Crime'
'A master of the surreal noir thriller - Luis Buñuel meets Georges Simenon' Times Literary Supplement
'A perfectly balanced cross between a thriller and a social document' L'Express
'A guaranteed grisly thriller' ShortList
'Arch and lyrical ... a funny and outlandish story' Crime Thriller Fella
'Garnier's main theme - the banality of a bourgeois existence - is a common one, although never, in my experience, has it been dealt with so succinctly ... a clever piece of literary noir' Killing Time Crime
'Garnier's books are marked by their integration of strange characters into their French provincial settings as evinced by The Panda Theory and How's The Pain? and always retain at their heart a sense of human frailty, despite the blackness of the humour and at times horrific events. Combining the style of Simenon with the visual imagination and humour of the Coen Brothers, there is much to recommend these novellas. They are small works of literary genius, and I would urge you to discover them for yourselves' Raven Crime Reads
'If you appreciate Georges Simenon's romans durs, i.e. his harder, edgier novels, Garnier is your boy ... He routinely tosses off penetrating philosophical truths like they're afterthoughts, as the French do so well. There's dark humor in these short novels, lots of apparently arbitrary brutality that's all the more chilling due to its seeming randomness, colourful characters, and some lines and passages that hit such a deep place, you just have to put the book down and reflect for a while after reading them' Criminal Element blog
