Before Nicolas Mathieu won the Prix Goncourt in 2018 for <i>And Their Children After Them </i>he wrote this <b>remarkable novel</b> about two small-town scallies who resort to crime when the local factory closes down . . . Mathieu, a wonderful writer,<b> echoes the grittiness and compassion of Émile Zola in <i>Germinal</i></b>
Sunday Times
There are several intersecting stories in this <b>bleakly uncompromising portrait of working-class life </b>in the Vosges . . . this tale of helpless, resentful people with nothing to lose is <b>powerful and compelling</b>.
- Laura Wilson, Guardian
Award-winning novelist Nicolas Mathieu portrays how the destruction of working-class communities has fed cynicism and despair.
- Conrad Landin, Jacobin Magazine
A first novel of rare power
Le Figaro Littéraire
Nicolas Mathieu has written one of the best crime novels of the year
Le Monde