Marlene A Novel

In this electrifying psychological drama, two veterans readjusting to civilian life find their friendship tested when ugly truths come to light.
 
Yemen. Iraq. Afghanistan. After returning from combat to a quiet garrison town, Dan and Richard struggle in their different ways to regain a sense of normality. Dan, desperate to prove to his bourgeois neighbors that he isn’t the violent, unstable veteran they’d expect, sticks to a rigorous routine and keeps his head down. Richard, on the other hand, doesn’t resist his impulses, repeatedly flouting the law and spending money he doesn’t have. All the while, his home life is gradually falling apart—unbeknownst to him, his wife has been having an affair, and his teenaged daughter is becoming increasingly distant and even hostile. 

The arrival of Richard’s sister-in-law, Marlene—a woman with a reputation for sleeping around and bringing bad luck wherever she goes—threatens to destroy what little peace the two men have, calling into question their seemingly unbreakable bond.

Philippe Djian is the award-winning author of more than twenty novels, including the bestseller 37°2 le matin, published in the United States as Betty Blue. His novel Elle (Other Press, 2017) was a bestseller in France, where it received the 2012 Prix Interallié, and was adapted into a film directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Isabelle Huppert.
 
Mark Polizzotti has translated more than fifty books from the French, including works by Gustave Flaubert, Patrick Modiano, Marguerite Duras, André Breton, and Raymond Roussel. A Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the recipient of a 2016 American Academy of Arts & Letters Award for Literature, he is the author of eleven books. He directs the publications program at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.