Tristan (The French List)

Summary

Introducing a refreshing young French voice to English readers, this slim novel is both a riveting love story and an examination of humanity's assault on the natural world.

After a seven-day journey on the South Atlantic Ocean aboard a lobster boat servicing Cape Town, Ida arrives on the island of Tristan. In the little island community, a village nestled on the slopes of a volcano whose only limits are the immense sky and the ocean, her bearings are gradually shifted as time slowly begins to expand.

When a cargo ship runs aground near a neighboring island, spilling massive amounts of oil, there is suddenly frantic activity in the town. Ida eagerly joins a team of three men who go to the small island to rescue oil-drenched penguins. One night, one of the men walks her back to the cabin where she is staying. They experience a night of love that continues to grow on the secluded island. For two weeks away from the world-the sea is rough, no boat can come to pick them up-the dance of their bodies and their all-consuming love is their only horizon.

Following the rhythm of the ocean and the untamed wind, Clarence Boulay brilliantly gives flesh to a dizzying sensation of sensual abandonment. Tristan raises emotional sails and upends all certainty.