2003 Longlist
In Our Strange Gardens
ABOUT
THE BOOK
Years ago, in the bitter years toward the end of WWII, two cousins found themselves at the mercy of a German guard following an explosive act of resistance. Thrown into a deep pit with a small group of terrified hostages, the men are told that one of them will die by dawn to serve as an example for the others. It’s up to the prisoners to propose who will be sacrificed. But then the guard returns with an extraordinary proposition of his own.
In years to come it will become an old man’s anecdote, a memory of a moment that once changed the lives of the men who lived it, and once recalled, will define the life of the boy to whom it was told.
ABOUT
THE TRANSLATOR Barbara
Bray
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Country
France
Original Language
French
Publisher
Riverhead Books
Translator
Barbara Bray
Nominating Library