The Last Life Book Cover

The Last Life


A General Fiction Novel

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Publisher Description

A "mesmerizing" novel from the acclaimed author of The Emperor's Children that is "as artful as it is affecting". Moving between colonial Algeria, the south of France, and New England, The Last Life is Claire Messud's sophomore novel of lies and ghosts, love and honor. When shots from a grandfather's rifle shatter the LaBasse family's quiet integrity, long-hidden shame emerges: a son abandoned by the family before he was even born, a mother whose identity is not what she has claimed, a father whose act of defiance brings Hotel Bellevue—the family business—to its knees. Unforgettably narrated by a fifteen-year-old girl with a ruthless regard for truth, The Last Life is a "phenomenally controlled tour de force."

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