casskrug 's review for:

Bonjour Tristesse / A Certain Smile by Françoise Sagan, Françoise Sagan

3.5

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second book for women in translation month! hadn’t been planning on reading these books (this book?) this summer but i was going through my TBR shelves looking for women in translation and thought it would be perfect for this time of year, and i was right! bonjour tristesse particularly reminded me of another great summer read - swimming home by deborah levy.

i’d give bonjour tristesse 4 stars and a certain smile 3 stars. the narrators of both books feel like continuations of each other, so i love that they were published in one volume. i think a certain smile was weaker, less gripping and tense, but i enjoyed reading it directly after bonjour tristesse because of that flow. both stories feel like a sweltering summer day filled with worries about unrequited love. the dialogue was sometimes a bit juvenile to me, but sagan was only 19 when she first got published so i can forgive it. the rest of the writing combined drama and humor in a really compelling way, i found it very evocative.