Vandal Love: A Novel - Softcover

Bechard, Deni Ellis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1571310916 ISBN 13: 9781571310910

Publisher: Milkweed Editions, 2012

Synopsis

An astonishing novel of epic ambition, Vandal Love winner of the prestigious Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for best first book in 2007 follows generations of a unique French-Canadian family across North America and through the twentieth century.

A family curse a genetic trick resulting from centuries of hardship causes the Hervé children to be born either giants or runts. Book One follows the giants’ line, exploring Jude Hervé’s career as a boxer in Georgia and Louisiana in the 1960s, his escape from that brutal life alone with his baby daughter Isa, and her eventual decision to enter into a strange, chaste marriage with a much older man. Book Two traces a different kind of life entirely, as the runts of the family discover that their power lies in a kind of unifying love. François seeks the identity of his missing father for years, while his own son, Harvey, flees from modern society into spiritual quests. But none of the Hervés can abandon their longing for a place where they might find others like themselves.

In assured and mystically powerful prose, Deni Y. Béchard tells a wide-ranging, spellbinding story of a family trying to create an identity in an unwelcoming landscape. Imbued throughout with a deep sensitivity to the physical world, Vandal Love is a breathtaking literary debut about the power of love to create and destroy in our lives, and in our history.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

Béchard has reinvented the generational novel with innovative brilliance. The book has all the quirky depth of a great HBO series and a line-to-line literary energy that is very rare. This is an enormously impressive debut by a clearly gifted writer.” Robert Olen Butler

Reminiscent of Proulx and Doctorow in both sweep and grace of prose, it is hard to believe that Vandal Love, so elegant and accomplished, is only Béchard’s first novel.” Dagoberto Gilb

The word masterpiece’ is not to be used lightly, but one is tempted in the case of Vandal Love, for the scope of its ambition, its originality, and its muscular use of language conjure a young Faulkner, García Márquez, or Steinbeck.” Katherine Min

A family curse a genetic trick resulting from centuries of hardship causes the Hervé children to be born either giants or runts. Book One follows the giants’ line, exploring Jude Hervé’s career as a boxer in Georgia and Louisiana in the 1960s, his escape from that brutal life with his baby daughter Isa, and her eventual decision to enter into a strange, chaste marriage with a much older man. Book Two traces a different line of life entirely, as the runts of the family discover that their power lies in a kind of unifying love. François seeks the identity of his missing father for years, while his own son flees from modern society into spiritual quests.

In assured and mystically powerful prose, Deni Y. Béchard tells a wide-ranging, spellbinding story of a family trying to create an identity in an unwelcoming landscape. Vandal Love is a breathtaking literary debut about the power of love to create and destroy.

Deni Y. Béchard was born in British Columbia to French Canadian and American parents, and grew up in both Canada and the United States. His articles, stories, and translations have appeared in a number of magazines and newspapers. He has also published a memoir, Cures for Hunger.

About the Author:

Deni Y. Bechard's first novel, "Vandal Love," (Doubleday Canada, 2006) won the 2007 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for the best first book in the entire British Commonwealth. He has been a fellow at MacDowell, Jentel, the Edward Albee Foundation, Ledig House, the Anderson Center, and the Vermont Studio Center, among others. His articles, stories and translations have appeared in a number of magazines and newspapers, among them the "National Post," the "Harvard Review" and the "Harvard Divinity Bulletin." He has done freelance reporting from Iraq, Afghanistan, and has lived in and traveled through over thirty countries. When not traveling, he divides his time between Japan, Cambridge, and Montreal. "Cures for Hunger" and "Vandal Love" are his first--and simultaneous--book-length publications in the United States.

About this edition

• Publisher: Milkweed Editions
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1571310916
• ISBN 13: 9781571310910
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 341