First Blood - by Amélie Nothomb (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

WINNER OF THE 2021 RENAUDOT PRIZE
WINNER OF THE 2022 STREGA EUROPEAN PRIZE
A WORLD LITERATURE TODAY NOTABLE BOOK 2023

A moving fictionalized account of Nothomb's own father, who died of Covid related symptoms in early 2020, this is the acclaimed author's most personal and heartfelt novel.

The Republic of the Congo, 1964. A young man faces a firing squad, preparing for his last moment on Earth. He is known as a complex and complicated man whose childhood left him hungry for affection and attention and who transformed his emotional wounds into a brilliant career as a diplomat and a negotiator. Now he finds himself negotiating for his own life, together with the lives of 1,500 Congolese citizens.

Inspired by the life of her father and by her lifelong effort to understand him, Amélie Nothomb's new novel is about life-and-death decisions, about reckoning with one's past, reconciling with one's parents, and about the hard, often humorous work of determining one's own path.

Review Quotes

"First Blood... tells an effortless story, offering much that can be enjoyed...Like 100 Years of Solitude, the novel opens with a man facing a firing squad...Eight months on, his life was forever affected by the death of his father and his mother's decision to let her parents raise him."--Declan O'Driscoll, The Irish Times

"First Blood is funny and engaging, the narrative voice appealing, the writing vivid and clever."--Frenchly

"Nothomb's crystalline re-remembrance is a spellcasting, one-sitting read that's Technicolor vivid and rich in joy, humor, and love."--Booklist

"This book is a gem."--Le Parisien

"Amélie Nothomb at her best: cruel, tender and funny."--Télérama

"A book bubbling in delightful humor and exuberant vitality."--Le Figaro