{"title":"Books by Hélène Bessette","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9781804271674","title":"Lili is Crying","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eLili is Crying\u003c\/em\u003e, Hélène Bessette’s debut novel, explores the fraughtness and depth of the troubling relationship between Lili and her mother Charlotte. With a near-mythic quality, Bessette’s stripped-back prose evokes at once the pain of thwarted love – of desire run cold – and the promise of renewal. Lauded by critics on its initial publication in 1953 for its boundary-pushing style, unusual economy of expression, strange humour and sheer vivacity, \u003cem\u003eLili is Crying\u003c\/em\u003e announces Bessette’s singular take on the ‘poetic novel’. This edition marks the very first translation of Bessette’s work into English, by Windham-Campbell Prize-winning author and translator Kate Briggs.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":55205894783349,"sku":"9781804271674","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781804271674.jpg?v=1786026654"},{"product_id":"twenty-minutes-of-silence","title":"Twenty Minutes of Silence","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn a family home in the north of France, a crime has been committed. But a crime of what order? Who exactly is the victim and who, if anyone, is the criminal? In \u003cem\u003eTwenty Minutes of Silence\u003c\/em\u003e, Hélène Bessette unleashes a polyphonic investigation, multiplying perspectives, contradictions, questions and doubts. Everything in this high-octane drama is subject to change, including the lighting and the basic facts of the case. Composed in her signature poetic prose style, Bessette’s novella builds a world punctured by startling disruptions and unexpected shifts, and in doing so destroys and remakes the crime novel, creating a form wholly new. Devastating and exuberant, \u003cem\u003eTwenty Minutes of Silence\u003c\/em\u003e is a vital interrogation of the powerlessness of childhood, the compromises of adulthood, and the conventions of the novel itself.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57487852142965,"sku":"9781804272152","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781804272152.jpg?v=1786355075"},{"product_id":"twenty-minutes-of-silence-1","title":"Twenty Minutes of Silence","description":"In an opulent villa near the English channel lives a well-to-do family. A man-a husband, father, and employer-has been shot dead. The bullet is from his own gun, which he got from the Germans during the war. In this family, the father has a safe, a monkey wrench, a wife, and a maid named Rose. The son has a swing, a croquet set, a rain coat, and a car. They all read detective novels to fall asleep (the father), to stay awake (the son), to distract herself from an empty marriage (the mother). Packed with brutal revelations, the novel centers on the twenty minutes of silence it takes for the family to alert the doctor (who lives next door) of the father's death. Everything in this high-octane drama is subject to change, including the setting and the characters, who are truer to life than might at first appear. But who if anyone is the true criminal and who is the victim? In this marvelous and sui generis novel, written in Bessette's signature taut and stripped-back prose, the detective novel is turned inside out and wholly on its head.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57499339587957,"sku":"9780811240369","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780811240369.jpg?v=1791213028"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-helene-bessette.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}