Dear lovers of literature, 

2012 is sure to bring a lot of great French Literature to English Readers with the greatly anticipated translations of books by Michel Houellebecq, Elisabeth Badinter, Laurent Binet, and Claude Lanzmann, among others. While you're going to have to wait a few more months to read some of these books, you might want to consider other recent French literary imports generating some buzz:

Lives Other Than My Own by Emmanuel Carrère
Bestselling author Emmanuel Carrère (Limonov; Renaudot Prize, 2011), now gives us Lives Other Than My Own in which he tells the story of two families stricken by tragedy, one losing a loved one to the Tsunami in Asia, the other to cancer. The thoughtful, at times confounding, book is part-memoir, part-reportage, and part-detective fiction. Carrère produces a beautiful and sober portrait of lives shattered yet ultimately restored. The book has received considerable acclaim in France.
(Metropolitan Books; translation by Linda Coverdale)
Preview, interview and review

An Accident in August by Laurence Cossé
An Accident in August immerses you in the troubling atmosphere which surrounded the death of Princess Diana in August 1997. In this intense and very original novel, Laurence Cossé places an enigmatic female figure at the scene of the infamous crash... This suspenseful book is sure to grasp your attention.
(Europa Editions; translation by Alison Anderson)
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A New History of French Medieval Literature by Jacqueline Cerquiglini-Toulet
In this engaging essay, Cerquiglini-Toulet redefines both the approach to medieval French literature and calls into question our modern concepts of the field. Both history of literature, and theoretical criticism, it poses crucial questions about the notion of otherness, the meaning of change and stability.
(Johns Hopkins University Press; translation by Sara L. Preisig)

The Inverted Gaze: Queering the French Literary Classics in America by François Cusset
Adopting Queer Theory's perspective that posits the hetero-normative ideology of our culture and challenges it, Cusset gives another reading to French literary classics. Providing an overview of reinterpretations by queer theorists of the French literary canon, he goes one step further, confronting the texts with a more general form of suspicion. The book, by the acclaimed author of French Theory (Univ. of Minnesota Press), is a highly intriguing essay on literature and sexuality throughout the ages, with all its polemics.
(Arsenal Pulp Press; Translation by David Homel)
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Private Property by Paule Constant
In Private Property, Tiffany, a 9 year-old French expatriate in Africa, loses all her bearings when her parents send her to a Catholic boarding school in France. Private Property is a moving portrait of a little girl, feeling inadequate, alien in her own country and only finding solace in the warm presence of her grandparents. Through this child eyes, Constant questions our sense of belonging.
(The University of Nebraska Press; translation by Margot Miller and France Grenaudier-Klijn)
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Memoirs of a Breton Paesant by Jean-Marie Déguignet
Born in 1834, Jean-Marie Déguignet began writing his memoirs in his 60's. Déguignet was unique not only as a literate peasant, but in his views on religion, science and the people that surrounded him, views that put him well ahead of his time. Memoirs of a Breton Paesant offers a very rare and fascinating account of an autodidact reflecting on a 19th-century rural Brittany way of life he fervently despised.
(Seven Stories Press; translation by Linda Asher)

Balzac's Omelette by Anka Muhlstein
In Balzac's Omelette, Anka Muhlstein draws an incredible portrait of Honoré de Balzac, using the author as a guide to 19th-century French culinary scene. She wittily describes the trend he helped create while incorporating food into literature, paving the way for Flaubert, Maupassant and Zola, who in turn paid tribute to food and the art of cooking in their work. A fantastic feast!
(Other Press; translation by Adriana Hunter)
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The Bear: History of a Fallen King by Michel Pastoureau
The Bear is a fascinating study of the animal from prehistory to the present. Pastoureau, well-known for his studies on colors and medieval heraldic, brings to light the mythology that has surrounded the animal throughout the ages, revealing its symbolic importance. The author relates how the venerated bear was dethroned as king of the animals to later become the emblematic stuffed animal figure.
(Harvard University Press; translation by George Holoch)
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The Animal Side by Jean-Christophe Bailly
The Animal Side is neither a pure philosophical essay, nor is it just a work of fiction, the charm of the book lays in the juxtaposition of both. Bailly, here, interrogates unsettling encounters with the animal, and its perplexing otherness. The Animal Side doubles as an efficient plea for the animal and is an excellent introduction to a very original writer acclaimed in France for his latest work Le Dépaysement (Seuil, 2011).
(Fordham University Press; translation by Catherine Porter)

The Philosopher's Touch: Sartre, Nietzsche, and Barthes at the Piano by François Noudelmann
In The Philosophers Touch: Sartre, Nietzsche and Barthes at the Piano, François Noudelmann explores the musicality behind three of the greatest minds in the 20th century. Known for their philosophical writings, Sartre, Nietzsche, and Barthes were all amateur piano players and lovers of music. Noudelmann's writing is elegant and clear as he navigates through the texts of these great thinkers to uncover the music behind the philosophy.
(Columbia University Press; translation by Brian J. Reilly)
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In the Time of the Blue Ball by Manuela Draeger
In these three short stories, Detective Bobby Potemkine and his musical dog Djin bring about a flavorful mix of mystery and maritime-adventures. This enchanting book introduces English language readers to postexoticism and the soft and outlandish voice of Manuela Dragger, one of four aliases of the remarkable author Antoine Volodine.
(Dorothy Press; translation by Brian and Valerie Evenson)
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Billy Fog and the Gift of Trouble Sight by Guillaume Bianco
Billy Fog has the gift of Trouble Sight, and when he takes his glasses off, he sees all the things that other kids can't—ghosts and ghouls, vampires and monsters… This excellent graphic novel has akin to Tim Burton has the awkwardness of The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and a dark and humorous Adam's Family-like atmosphere. The drawings are as charming as can be.
(Archaia Entertainment; translation by Edward Gauvin)
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We hope you enjoyed this selection.

With our very best wishes, bonne lecture!

Book Department, New York