A revelatory meditation on class and consumer culture, from 2022 Nobel laureate Annie Ernaux
“A dryly charming look at the way the French live now, through the sharp eyes of its most acclaimed chronicler.”—Kirkus Reviews
For half a century, the French writer Annie Ernaux has transgressed the boundaries of what stories are considered worth telling, what subjects worth exploring. In this probing meditation, Ernaux turns her attention to the phenomenon of the big-box superstore, a ubiquitous feature of modern life that has received scant attention in literature.
Recording her visits to a store near Paris for over a year, she captures the world that exists within its massive walls. Through Ernaux’s eyes, the superstore emerges as “a great human meeting place, a spectacle”—a flashy, technologically advanced incarnation of the ancient marketplace where capitalism, cultural production, and class converge, dictating our rhythms of desire. With her relentless powers of observation, Ernaux takes the measure of a place we thought we knew, calling us to question the experiences we overlook and to gaze more deeply into ordinary life.
Annie Ernaux is the winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize for Literature. She is the author of more than twenty books, including The Years, A Woman’s Story, A Man’s Place, Shame, and Simple Passion. Alison L. Strayer is an award-winning writer and translator.
“A wonderful addition to Annie Ernaux’s life writings . . . [and] a fascinating contribution to contemporary literature.”—Geneviève Alvarado, World Literature Today
“[A] beautiful book. . . . With rigor and tenderness, Annie Ernaux shows herself. . . . If she says ‘I,’ it is to hear others better. From the margins of a suburban superstore, she illuminates the heart of our lives.”—Jean Birnbaum, Le Monde
“A dryly charming look at the way the French live now, through the sharp eyes of its most acclaimed chronicler.”—Kirkus Reviews
“This slim book enlarges our sense of ourselves, insisting as it does on how alike we are.”—Michael Autrey, Booklist
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