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(More customer reviews)In an arch, assured style, Duteurtre alternates two plots, one of a death-row prisoner putting a cog in the legal system by demanding his right to a final cigarette before his execution and an adult intellectual who feels at odds in a world where children are worshipped as gods. Duteurtre uses these two plots as vehicles for his real agenda: to satirize modern day's love of political correctness, utopian-visioned do-gooders, absurd legalism, and a society so bereft of ideals and so soggy-brained that its only "religion" is the adoration of the child, as a sort of symbol of society's replenishment and renewal. The satire is never forced or obvious, as too many books that attempt humor are guilty of. Instead, the author effortlessly weaves his satirical themes into his narrative so that the book mirrors our modern day absurdities with crystal clear vision and gives us a facile story at once. As this is the first book of many to be translated into English, I must either learn French or wait eagerly for Duteurtre's other books to be translated.
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A wicked satire about the chaos that results when there's a rule for everything.
In the over-legislated world of this outrageous black comedy, a death-row inmatebecomes a darling of the media-- and the tobacco conglomerates--after he demandshis right to a final cigarette . . . in a smoke-free prison. Meanwhile, a littlegirl accuses a petty municipal bureaucrat of sexual perversion when she catches himsneaking a cigarette. Incredulously, he realizes that in this world where childrenare not just kings, but tyrants, a cigarette could lead him to the electric chair.
At the cutting edge of European fiction, controversial young author Benoît Duteurtrecreates a world wildly askew, yet disconcertingly close to our own, in this daring,antic satire.
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