A devastating short novel about a mother who takes her two young sons on an overnight trip to the seaside.

What begins as a small, almost ordinary excursion slowly turns into a journey shaped by poverty, exhaustion, dread, maternal love, and the terror of not being able to protect the children one loves most. Olmi’s prose is spare, intimate and claustrophobic, working through the mother’s voice as her thoughts circle between tenderness, panic, practical detail and unbearable fear. It is the kind of novella that does a great deal with very little space: motherhood without sentimentality, social abandonment without lecture, psychological collapse without spectacle. For readers of Peirene, Annie Ernaux, Marguerite Duras, Agota Kristof, Jenny Erpenbeck, or anyone drawn to short European fiction that leaves a bruise.

Peirene Press paperback, translated from the French. Good second-hand condition overall, with light handling and shelfwear. Includes front quote/support sticker for the Maya Centre.