Description
Enter the world of Pascal Garnier, where life’s misfits take centre stage, there is drama in the everyday and the unexpected is always just around the corner.
Dark, funny and shot through with menace, these perfectly crafted novellas are also affecting studies in human alienation.
Massively acclaimed by both reviewers and fellow authors, Garnier has been compared to many other writers, yet he remains the master of his own unique brand of Gallic noir.
Volume 2 includes:
Boxes, which tells the story of Brice, ‘the sole survivor of the natural disaster that at one time or another strikes us all, known as ‘moving house’’
The Front Seat Passenger, in which a widower discovers his wife had a lover and decides to track down his widow
The Islanders, whose protagonist Olivier finds himself thrown back together with a childhood friend with whom he shares a dark secret
Moon in a Dead Eye, in which the paranoia of the residents of a gated retirement village spins out of control.
Reviews for Boxes
‘It’s dark, stomach-twisting stuff, and the mysteries surrounding Emma’s whereabouts and Brice’s striking visual similarity to someone in Blanch’s past keep you turning the pages hungrily.’ La Friction
‘Quirky and unsettling…’ Fiction Fan’s Book Reviews
‘..a horribly funny novel about bereavement: appalling and bracing in equal measure.’ John Banville
‘ I would recommend Boxes by Pascal Garnier to anyone who enjoys reading a mystery. Garnier adds a plot twist at the very end that will have you grabbing for another one of his books.’ San Diego Book Review
‘Garnier calmly peels back the revealing layers, leaving a raw sort of horror all the more devastating for its believable simplicity.’The Complete Review
‘It is an achievement for an author to write in finely crafted prose but for a translator to convey that in another language is significant too. This story kept me reading without stopping! Not the first time from Gallic Books. It also has an unexpected ending. It is good to leave a book feeling there is more material in it for your mind to conjure with and this does just that!’ D.Olser, NetGalley reviewer
‘…this one will help reinforce his cult status among noir fans.’ Publishers Weekly
‘The story is told in clear concise prose and although there is plenty of dark matter there are also surreal touches, and moments of real humour. This is quality writing; those who enjoy Highsmith and Simenon, in particular, may find it to their taste.’ Crime Review
‘It’s an atmospheric and absorbing tale, an exploration of loss and abandonment, often quirkily amusing and sometimes very moving.’ M.Jenkinson, NetGalley reviewer
Reviews for The Front Seat Passenger
‘A small but perfectly formed piece of darkest noir fiction told in spare, mordant prose … Recounted with disconcerting matter‑of-factness, this marvellously unpredictable story is surreal and horrific in equal measure.’ The Guardian
‘A dark, richly odd and disconcerting world … devastating and brilliant’ Sunday Times
‘Simenon’s romans durs as channeled through the vision behind Wim Wenders’ early films … It goes down quickly, and readily, but it hits at a place that will leave readers feeling uneasy for some time after they turn the last page.’ Brian Greene, Crime Time
‘The author is masterful at conjuring an oppressive, subtly menacing atmosphere, livening up even the most run-of-the-mill descriptions with wry philosophical asides.’ Crime Fiction Lover
‘It is this ability of Garnier to insert the ridiculous and the horrific in fairly normal aspects of life and turns of events that set him so far apart from his contemporaries.’ Raven Crime
‘Another short, dark, clever tale that doesn’t really go in the direction you think it will … The Front Seat Passenger can be read as a thriller, but also as a modern parable warning against the dangers of obsession and self-absorption.’ Killing Time
‘Addictive, paced perfectly and a lovely example of noir with a twist’ Liz Loves Books
‘It doesn’t waste a word – the work of a master’ Mr Hyde
‘The Front Seat Passenger is the story of what happens when people’s lives intersect after a tragedy, especially when those people already have their own dysfunction. It is a noir story with a distinctive French setting and some unexpected plot twists.’ Margot Kinberg
‘Exquisite noir’ Publishers Weekly
‘It’s clever and razor-sharp writing and plotting, with deceptive calm and innocence and naïveté, and then shocking, sudden horror. No question, Garnier was a master of his art, and a wonderful-terrible art it was.’ M.A. Orthofer, The Complete Review
‘The Front Seat Passenger is a short novel – I read it in a day – but the story is unyielding in the madness of its characters … This is an ironic and darkly humorous book that I thoroughly enjoyed.’ Suspense Magazine
Reviews for The Islanders
‘…wickedly fun stuff, and wonderfully dark scenes (and horrible people) from modern life.’The Complete Review
‘The perfect subversive Christmas read’ Mr B’s Bookshop
‘The perfect antidote to saccharine Christmas tales’Curiosity Killed the Bookworm
‘A banquet of darkly comic noir’ Shiny New Books
‘The ultimate anti-feel-good Christmas story … how does Garnier manage to deliver, again and again, in such succinct formats, a devastatingly accurate description of people on the margins of society and on the borderline of alcoholism and madness?’ Finding Time to Write
Reviews for Moon in a Dead Eye
‘Tense, strange, disconcerting and slyly funny, this is – for such a short book – richly satisfying. The characters, all original and convincing, are deftly realised, and the story exerts a compelling grip… His mordant literary edge makes these succinct novels stimulating and rewarding. We can only hope that more appear soon.’ Sunday Times
‘The final descent into violence is worthy of J G Ballard’ (4 stars) The Independent
‘Fuses dark comedy and existential despair … a takedown of the haughty residents of an exclusive retirement community. All that’s needed is a caravan of Gypsies to turn these smug provincials into savage beasts.’ Marilyn Stasio, New York Times
‘Garnier (1949–2010) packs humor, insights into aging, and a darkly pessimistic assessment of mankind into this slender crime novel’ Publishers Weekly
‘A short but beautiful and quirky read’ Liz Loves Books
‘Arch and lyrical … a funny and outlandish story’ Crime Thriller Fella
‘Garnier’s main theme – the banality of a bourgeois existence – is a common one, although never, in my experience, has it been dealt with so succinctly … a clever piece of literary noir’ Killing Time Crime
‘Digs beneath the apparent respectability of provincial life to reveal the violence lurking beneath … leavened with a biting satirical humour (reminiscent of Patricia Highsmith or the German author Ingrid Noll) … beautifully and precisely written. 4 stars.’ Mrs Peabody Investigates
‘There is a dry humour in the story … and although a slim read, the characters are well written and rounded. It reminds me in some ways of P G Wodehouse although the characters are not caricatures, they are believable – I am sure we have all met Martial, Odette and Co sometimes in our life. Recommended as a good entertaining read.’ Eurocrime
‘Wonderfully eerie and darkly humorous’ Durango Herald
‘Fans of Georges Simenon and the films of Quentin Tarantino and the Coen brothers will enjoy this dark look at what happens when dreams and reality collide in the sunset years of life. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.’ I Love a Mystery Newsletter’
Praise for Pascal Garnier
‘Wonderful… Properly noir’ Ian Rankin
‘Garnier plunges you into a bizarre, overheated world, seething death, writing, fictions and philosophy. He’s a trippy, sleazy, sly and classy read’ A. L. Kennedy
‘Horribly funny … appalling and bracing in equal measure. Masterful’ John Banville
‘Ennui, dislocation, alienation, estrangement – these are the colours on Garnier’s palette. His books are out there on their own, short, jagged and exhilarating’ Stanley Donwood
‘The combination of sudden violence, surreal touches and bone-dry humour have led to Garnier’s work being compared with the films of Tarantino and the Coen brothers’ Sunday Times
‘Deliciously dark … painfully funny’ New York Times
‘A mixture of Albert Camus and JG Ballard’ Financial Times
‘A brilliant exercise in grim and gripping irony; makes you grin as well as wince’ Sunday Telegraph
‘A master of the surreal noir thriller – Luis Buñuel meets Georges Simenon’ Times Literary Supplement
‘Devastating and brilliant’ Sunday Times
‘Bleak, often funny and never predictable’ The Observer
Jane Aitken studied history at St Anne’s College, Oxford. She is a publisher and translator from the French.
Emily Boyce is a translator and editor. Her translation of A Long Way Off by Pascal Garnier was runner up for the 2021 Scott Moncrieff Prize.
Melanie Florence teaches at The University of Oxford and translates from the French.
