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le vieux petit ami qui a trouvé refuge dans ton cœur et chez qui nous habitons et rions et gémissons parfois Il sera content de jouer dans le spielplatz de la Zillestraße et ne te sens nulle obligation mon enfant de veiller sur les membres si fins si blancs de ce garçon sec poussiéreux. (21) A mother carries a great weight. Bradley University (IL) Alexander Hertich OLMI, VÉRONIQUE. Cet été-là. Paris: Grasset, 2010. ISBN 978-2-2467-7011-4. Pp. 283. 18 a. Friends and family come together for the annual holiday weekend at the shore. Commonplace? Not coming from the pen of Véronique Olmi, the novelist and playwright who combines the talents necessary for these two genres in Cet été-là, a novel of self-revelation and self-discovery. It is true that the premise is timeworn but that is all the more reason to appreciate Olmi’s discreet narration and well-constructed plot and characters. What is striking from the outset is the theatricality of this work. Structurally and in its composition, it resembles a play in many respects. The short chapters are like scenes and there is a sense that the unity of time is respected, as the action takes place almost exclusively during a long Bastille Day weekend. Olmi gives markers to clarify the temporal context; a Bac question concerning Obama, references to Facebook, and contemporary music situate this in our time and will make this book an interesting cultural document for readers years from now. A seaside town in Normandy serves as the setting and the protagonists do not venture far from the summer home that seems to force them to confront each other and themselves. The characters, too, resemble the cast of a play, and Olmi presents all but one early on, in the manner of a classical exposition. Denis and Delphine, the wealthy middle-aged couple who own the summer home, are unhappy in their marriage (he distant, she unfaithful); their friend Lola comes to these weekends with a different man each year, always younger than she (Samuel being the chosen one this time), and Nicolas and Marie, somewhat older, are dear friends who are facing their own crises, she for her fading career as an actress, he as he battles depression . Delphine and Denis’s young son and their adolescent daughter Jeanne and her friend should add to the image of a perfect family but they in fact serve to highlight the aging process faced by the older generation. Olmi emphasizes her dramatic characterization: “Chaque année il en était ainsi, les mêmes gestes, les mêmes images dans le même paysage, et la joie de se retrouver, avec les rôles distribu és” (35). The cast is assembled, the stage is set and, scene after scene, the action unfolds. When there is dialogue we can recognize the love shared by the five characters who have known each other for thirty years and the tensions, great and small, that plague their relationships. The presence of Samuel accentuates the strength of the bonds that unite them because he is an outsider. The omniscient narrator betrays what each is really thinking, feeling, and hoping for, and the contrast between what is said and what is hidden is one important artistic facet of Olmi’s style. Reviews 1207 The appearance of a stranger, twenty-year old Dimitri, endangers the tenuous order that has allowed the characters to function and to be happy together thus far. He is mysterious and somewhat unnerving to the adults yet attractive to Jeanne, and his presence allows Samuel to feel more complicity with the tightlyknit group. Dimitri, by his very role as an interloper, is a catalyst, bringing to light the fears and hidden agendas of the characters. We see how the rituals which allow them to remain in stasis, to avoid conflict that is too threatening, are pure fabrications. As Delphine says to herself: “C’est le principe du rite: l’immobilisme ” (221). But she will change, as will other protagonists, at the end of the novel. There is hope, but this is not a saccharine ending. The reality...

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