Geography of an Adultery

Dissecting a midlife affair, this perceptive, slyly comical debut explores how the spaces that limit our movements can be more exciting than the person we think we want.

Ema and Paul are lovers. Like so many others before them, they met through work. Both are married with children, and they arrange hurried meetings away from prying eyes. Paul’s car, a corner of Ema’s house, a hotel room…But their relationship soon suffers from this too-restricted sphere, and Ema decides to put them both in danger, at the risk of losing everything.
 
Cleverly attaching itself to the locations where passion plays out—whether domestic or professional, safe or transgressive—Geography of an Adultery casts a radical eye on anticipation and desire. With her deceptively cool, clinically precise style, Agnès Riva unravels the inner workings of a private life.

Agnès Riva lives in the suburbs of Paris, where she draws inspiration from its urban landscape. She is the author of the short story “New Life,” which was published in the anniversary issue of the New French Review. Her debut novel, Geography of an Adultery, was a finalist for the Goncourt First Novel Prize and RTL-Lire Grand Prix.

John Cullen (1942–2021) is the translator of many books from Spanish, French, German, and Italian, including Siegfried Lenz’s The Turncoat, Juli Zeh’s Empty Hearts, Patrick Modiano’s Villa Triste, Kamel Daoud’s The Meursault Investigation, and Philippe Claudel’s Brodeck.