The Scapegoat

by Daniel Pennac

Book Overview

"Mafia Tribute" ist eine faszinierende Reise in die gef hrliche Welt der Unterwelt, wo Loyalit t mit Leben und Tod bezahlt wird. Diese eindringliche Beschreibung enth llt die komplexen Beziehungen und... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1860466117
• ISBN13: 9781860466113
• Release Date: January 1999
• Publisher: Harvill Press
• Length: 215 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.1" x 7.7"

Customer Reviews

The first of a brilliant series...

A delightful family, where it is impossible to have a boring day; a wonderful prose and the excuse of a couple of murders to make things more entertaining; I dare you to read ONLY one of the stories of Benjamin, Julie, Claire, Therese, Jeremy, Loubna, the Queen Zabo and the rest of the Malaussene tribe. You won't stop until you'll read them all.

Great style, great suspense, wonderful characters.

This is the first of four books, all built around Benjamin Malaussene, a man whose job is to be blamed for everything that goes wrong at work. Every time a client complaints, the staff somehow blames it on him: he is known to his coworkers as a professional scapegoat.However, when the store he works at is the host of a bomb, then another, people start to point fingers, and this novel develops around this plot made of bombs and scapegoating.This novel is worth everyone's full attention: the characters are very believable, and the way they relate to each other is nothing short of sublime. Also, Pennac's frequent use of sarcasm and bitter wit adds to the punch of the novel, where it comes to a point where, even though you want to know how it ends (just like every good police intrigue novel), you can't get enough of the dialogues and discussions.Open this book and sit back, because this book is like no other whodunnit novel. (In fact, it's almost insulting to call it that.)

Funky, Funny, and Very French

This series of "mystery" novels is great fun! They bring to life the Belleville/Menilmontant quarter of Paris with hip, fast-paced prose and plenty of slang. The setting, characters, and philosophizing is ultimately more interesting than what is supposed to be a "mystery," but that doesn't detract from the read. Unfortunately, the translation is laughably bad, putting British slang into the French characters' mouths! Still, this a funky---and very French---series.

Refreshing

Written like a crazy tale about the crazy life of a generous and violent and heterogenous set of communities living together in a Paris district.

The best contemporary French writer

Daniel Pennac saved my sanity. I once believed that I did not like French litterature as a whole, too heavy, too deep, but "The Scapegoat" changed all of this. It is at once deliriously crazy, familiar and smart! A very, very good read.