Fire in the Blood
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Overview
From the celebrated author of the international bestseller Suite Française, a newly discovered novel, a story of passion and long-kept secrets, set against the background of a rural French village in the years before World War II.Written in 1941, Fire in the Blood – only now assembled in its entirety – teems with the intertwined lives of an insular French village in the years before the war, when "peace" was less important as a political state than as a coveted personal condition: the untroubled pinnacle of happiness. At the center of the novel is Silvio, who has returned to this small town after years away. As his narration unfolds, we are given an intimate picture of the loves and infidelities, the scandals, the youthful ardor and regrets of age that tie Silvio to the long-guarded secrets of the past.Synopsis
From the author of the universally acclaimed and bestselling Suite Francaise: a newly discovered novel, never before published'a story of passion and long-kept secrets, set against the background of a rural French village in the years before World War II.
We hear the voice of Silvio: a man getting on in years who has returned to the village of his youth after a long time abroad. He lives by himself, enjoys his wine and his solitude. But a visit from his cousin Hélène and her husband François, with their future son-in-law in tow, begins to draw Silvio back into the life of his family and of this insular community, toward the revelation of secrets he and others have guarded for decades. As the novel unfolds, we are given an intimate picture of the web of marriage and infidelity, loyalties set against love, trust and betrayal, scandal vying with reputation, evils petty and potent, youthful passions and regrets of age that tie Silvio to both his past and the unexpected events of...
The New York Times - Christopher Benfey
If I had read Fire in the Blood knowing nothing of its author or the circumstances of its composition, I would have guessed it was by some elegist of the French countryside like Jean Giono. Knowing that Nemirovsky completed this book about the timeless fire of love at the very moment an all-too-historical fire of hatred was snaking through France adds a painful poignancy to the reading experience. One can't help wondering whether the deeply held secrets at the heart of the plot had anything to do with Nemirovsky's own double life as she tried desperately to blend into an ordinary village in extraordinary times. With the return to print of four of Nemirovsky's earlier novels (including David Golder) planned for the coming months, we will soon be in a better position to judge precisely where this modest melodrama belongs in the larger achievement of a complex and remarkable writer.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
Irène Némirovsky (1903-42) penned a novel that is perhaps the first literary work written about World War II, but it remained unpublished for more than 60 years. When her unfinished Suite Française was finally released, it became an international bestseller. Another novel, this one complete, has now surfaced. Fire in the Blood is set in a small village, based on Issy l'Evèque, where Suite Française was written. With a deft hand, Némirovsky renders personal conflicts and hidden motives in this rural peasant community, some of which prefigure those of Suite Française. A significant work by a Jewish writer who died of typhus at Auschwitz.Christopher Benfey
If I had read Fire in the Blood knowing nothing of its author or the circumstances of its composition, I would have guessed it was by some elegist of the French countryside like Jean Giono. Knowing that Nemirovsky completed this book about the timeless fire of love at the very moment an all-too-historical fire of hatred was snaking through France adds a painful poignancy to the reading experience. One can't help wondering whether the deeply held secrets at the heart of the plot had anything to do with Nemirovsky's own double life as she tried desperately to blend into an ordinary village in extraordinary times. With the return to print of four of Nemirovsky's earlier novels (including David Golder) planned for the coming months, we will soon be in a better position to judge precisely where this modest melodrama belongs in the larger achievement of a complex and remarkable writer.—The New York Times
Publishers Weekly
Silvio, the narrator of Némirovsky's brief, posthumously published novel, lives alone on his small farm in pre-WWII rural France, committed to his permanent bachelorhood. But as he watches the affairs of young people around him, he recalls his early love life and the dying embers in his spirit start to glow again. Bramhall reflects this well in his deep, harsh voice by building up from Silvio's tone of quiet disdain and aloofness into one of possessive fervor. The French-accented English he uses for all conversation helps listeners place the story on a cognitive map. His voice lulls listeners past noticing the novel's unfinished state. The dropped strands of the plot, the chapters consisting of just a few paragraphs and the scenes with rougher edges all fade thanks to his low but intense growl. Fans of Némirovsky's more polished Suite Françaiseand romantics with a taste for passionately spoken French, will be swept up by this entrancing and evocative tale. Simultaneous release with the Knopf hardcover (Reviews, Sept. 3). (Oct.)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business InformationLibrary Journal
If you loved the author's Suite Française-and how could you not?-you'll likewise take to this recently discovered treasure by Némirovsky, who perished in Auschwitz. "Fire in the blood" is the passion that propels all kinds of human triumphs and follies in the lives of otherwise undistinguished French paysans, citizens of the countryside in the early part of the last century, "a region that has something restrained yet savage about it, something affluent and yet distrustful that is reminiscent of another time, long past." Love, intrigue, mystery, death, and murder all figure in this exquisitely wrought tale, as related by the reclusive Silvio, who reconstructs an ultimately shocking family history that links the generations in unexpected ways. So great is Némirovsky's reading of the human heart that her tale has the power of myth. And so true does it ring to reality that one could call it not so much a love but a life story. If anyone has taken an accurate reading of the pulse of the French, it is surely Némirovsky. Beautifully translated, this work is enthusiastically recommended for all collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ5/1/07.]
—Edward Cone