Of Fangs and Talons

THE FIRST NOVEL BY NICOLAS MATHIEU, WINNER OF THE 2018 PRIX GONCOURT

A literary crime novel of the new social order, where the white lower class blames their bosses, the Arabs, the rich, and the whole world at the same time... It is the story of a world that has come to an end. With a girl, a .45 Colt, and the snow.

A factory closes in the Vsoges, and nobody cares. Hundreds of people have been sacked, they're now unemployed, on benefits, their kids won't go to summer camp anymore. There's a couple of news items in the evening, and then basta.

But factories are full of dangerous people with nothing left to lose. Like Martel, the trade union guy who collects tattoos, or Bruce, the body-builder addicted to steroids. People who have the time and the bad idea to kidnap a girl on the pavements of Strasbourg and sell her to two big guns of the criminal underworld...

"[An] uncompromising portrait of a working class eaten up by the frustration and resentment of having been abandoned, and sinking into alcoholism and racism". -- Paris Match