ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Marie-Claire Blais wishes to thank Francine Dumouchel and Marie Couillard.
Nigel Spencer thanks his sons, Antoine and Olivier, with Pauline Karolewicz, for their great patience and support, as well as his mother, Phyllis Tester Spencer, recently deceased.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
MARIE-CLAIRE BLAIS is the internationally revered author of more than twenty-five books, many of which have been published around the world. In addition to the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, which she has won four times, Blais has been awarded the Gilles-Corbeil Prize, the Médicis Prize, the Molson Prize, and Guggenheim Fellowships. She divides her time between Quebec and Florida.
ALSO BY MARIE-CLAIRE BLAIS
FICTION
The Angel of Solitude
Anna’s World
David Sterne
Deaf to the City
The Fugitive
A Literary Affair
Mad Shadows
The Manuscripts of Pauline Archange
A Season in the Life of Emmanuel
Tête Blanche
These Festive Nights
The Wolf
Thunder and Light
Augustino and the Choir of Destruction
NONFICTION
American Notebooks: A Writer’s Journey
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER
House of Anansi Press was founded in 1967 with a mandate to publish Canadian-authored books, a mandate that continues to this day even as the list has branched out to include internationally acclaimed thinkers and writers. The press immediately gained attention for significant titles by notable writers such as Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, George Grant, and Northrop Frye. Since then, Anansi’s commitment to finding, publishing and promoting challenging, excellent writing has won it tremendous acclaim and solid staying power. Today Anansi is Canada’s pre-eminent independent press, and home to nationally and internationally bestselling and acclaimed authors such as Gil Adamson, Margaret Atwood, Ken Babstock, Peter Behrens, Rawi Hage, Misha Glenny, Jim Harrison, A. L. Kennedy, Pasha Malla, Lisa Moore, A. F. Moritz, Eric Siblin, Karen Solie, and Ronald Wright. Anansi is also proud to publish the award-winning nonfiction series The CBC Massey Lectures. In 2007, 2009, 2010, and 2011 Anansi was honoured by the Canadian Booksellers Association as “Publisher of the Year.”