The Wine of Solitude
  • Published: 18 September 2012
  • ISBN: 9780099520375
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $45.00

The Wine of Solitude

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EBook
1 Dec 2011
Paperback
18 Sep 2012
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From the author of Suite Française comes a powerful novel of family, war and the end of innocence

From the author of the bestselling Suite Française.

Hélène is a troubled young girl. Neglected by her self-absorbed mother and her adored but distant father, she longs for love and for freedom. As first the Great War and then the Russian Revolution rage in the background, she grows from a lonely, melancholy child to an angry young woman intent on destruction.

The Wine of Solitude is a powerful tale of an unhappy family in difficult times and a woman prepared to wreak a shattering revenge.
  • Published: 18 September 2012
  • ISBN: 9780099520375
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $45.00
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About the author

Irène Némirovsky

Irène Némirovsky was born in Kiev in 1903, the daughter of a successful Jewish banker. In 1918 her family fled the Russian Revolution for France where she became a bestselling novelist, author of David Golder, All Our Worldly Goods, The Dogs and the Wolves and other works published in her lifetime or soon after, such as the posthumously published Suite Française and Fire in the Blood. She was prevented from publishing when the Germans occupied France and moved with her husband and two small daughters from Paris to the safety of the small village of Issy-l'Evêque (in German occupied territory). It was here that Irène began writing Suite Française. She died in Auschwitz in 1942.

portrait photo of Irène Némirovsky

Also by Irène Némirovsky

Suite Francaise
The Dogs and the Wolves
Jezebel
The Fires of Autumn
The Misunderstanding
Fire in the Blood
The Courilof Affair
See all

Praise for The Wine of Solitude

Sandra Smith's translation is mellifluous and certain passages - the opening lines describing dusk in Kiev, for example - are breathtaking

Angel Gurria-Quintana, Financial Times

Nemirovksy captures the rootless existence of emigres beautifully

Shirley Whiteside, Herald

Némirovsky excels at describing this dysfunctional household

Marianne Brace, Independent

A wonderfully atmospheric novel...captivating and searingly honest... A brilliant coming of age novel

Helen Dunmore, Guardian, Books of the Year

Haunting...profound...exquisitely wrought

Independent on Sunday

The tangle of this unhappy family is beautifully and ruthlessly analysed... The relationship between mother and daughter is described with uncompromising lucidity... Némirovsky evokes the places of her childhood with a sensuous clarity

Guardian

The Wine of Solitude is an end-of-innocence story... It is Némirovsky's powers of social observation...the implacable eye for the nuances of human conduct, that make The Wine of Solitude so memorable

Financial Times

Beautifully written... Her ability to evoke the feeling of time and especially place is remarkable

Scotsman

One of the best of her early novels... it is written with luminous intensity

Jane Shilling, Evening Standard, Books of the Year

It's an unerring portrait of a neglected, baleful and punitive daughter

Julian Barnes, Guardian, Books of the Year

This is Nemrovsky's most autobiographical novel...recalled in hauntingly atmospheric detail

Peter Kemp, Sunday Times, Books of the Year

Sandra Smith’s translation of the novel faithfully reflects Nemirovsky’s talents as an astute portraitist and storyteller

Emma Hagestadt, Guardian

Nemirovsky evokes a time and a place when domestic upheaval could prove every bit as tragic and bloody as those played out on a wider stage

Emma Hagestadt, Independent