Breathing Underwater

Description

Without telling her husband, a young woman drives off to the coast. She takes only her young daughter, and ten thousand francs. They spend the first night camping on the beach, and then rent an apartment in a small seaside town near the Spanish border. She is careful to leave no clues. But a detective is already looking for them, and he knows it will only be a matter of time before she makes a mistake . . .

Marie Darrieussecq was born in 1969 in Bayonne, France. She is a graduate of the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris. Her debut novel, Pig Tales (1996), was published in 34 countries and became the most popular first novel in France since the 1950s. Her second novel,My Phantom Husband (1998), became an immediate bestseller. Her third novel, Breathing Underwater, prompted Francis Gilbert in The Times to declare that 'there are very few writers who may have changed my perception of the world, but Darrieussecq is one of them'. Her most recent novel, White, was published in 2005.

'There are very few writers who may have changed my perception of the world, but Darrieussecq is one of them'. Francis Gilbert, The Times 'This is an extraordinary novel by a stunningly talented writer... To give shape to disassociation and substance to emptiness - to "hover above the void" - takes considerable courage and commitment'. Alex Clark, Guardian