L'avancée de la nuit by Jakuta Alikavazovic (review)

The title, cover photo, and back cover description of this edition might seem to suggest nothing more than the fervent romance of a young couple, but this proves to be only one plot point in a story that radiates out over several decades and over a few laterally developed relationships. More intriguingly, the novel alludes pointedly to other histories that lurk in the background as possible explanations that never quite emerge as narrative: specifically, the Bosnian war as epitomized by the siege of Sarajevo, the abandonment by a mother of her young daughter (Amélia), and the struggles of an immigrant to establish his family (Paul's) in a European capital. The story that readers do have of Amélia and Paul is dogged by these and other unknowns. The couple begin their liaison in the charmless predictability of an American hotel franchise,"l'Elisse."Paul is a security guard for the hotel and spends his nights scanning multiple screens to ensure the safety of hotel residents. His glimpses into Amélia's private life eventually transform into genuine ingress in her hotel room, which becomes the single secure place for their love-making. Love and security (security from violence, but also security as its own kind of violence) become leitmotivs that get paired up in various and sometimes contradictory combinations throughout the novel. At one point, Amélia as a card-carrying member of the junior jet set is invited with those of her economic tribe to demolish the interior of a distinguished old luxury hotel. She and Paul are recorded in grainy footage in a violent embrace as plastered décor crumbles around them. A beloved friend with connections to Amélia's missing mother becomes a trusted surrogate mother offering a second home. In spite of heightened building security, the friend is murdered on the doorstep of her own apartment. Paul in his later years, single-parenting his and Amélia's daughter, Louise, builds a security chamber in their apartment and has a micro-chip implanted in his daughter's arm to be able to keep track of her whereabouts, measures that backfire spectacularly. As the novel makes clear about contemporary culture, love and loved ones are threatened by all manner of violence, particularly the kinds of violence one cannot begin to control or fend off: xenophobia, civil wars, urban violence, toxins, light pollution, lust for lucre, graft, and indifference. In exchange, and the novel represents this with an exceedingly light but sure touch, trust in love can often be the best antidote against a world of uncertain and invisible harms. This belief seems to be the fundamental wisdom to be drawn from Paul and Amélia's enduring relationship. This and Alikavazovic's refreshingly unusual perception of contemporary environments and their effects on human consciousness make the novel worth reading.