A Sunday in Ville-d'Avray

'Beguiling and immensely enjoyable.' --Irish Times I was in the melancholy state of mind that often comes over me when I go to see my sister, and I think I started by getting a little lost . . . It's a Sunday in early September and a woman leaves muggy Paris to visit her sister in the western suburbs of the city. Ville-d’Avray is less than an hour away, but it seems like another world with its secluded streets and set-back houses. The sisters' relationship is ambiguous. the woman's visits to Ville-d’Avray tend to leave her discomfited; for all Claire Marie's seeming provincial passivity, she knows exactly how to get under her sister's skin. As they settle into the torpor of the afternoon, Claire Marie describes a curious encounter from her past. Sundays are when she thinks about life – whether she expected something more from it, and whether she is still waiting for it to begin. Sharply observed and wryly funny, A Sunday in Ville-d’Avray is a haunting novel about half-shared truths and desires that can never fully be expressed.