My Golden Days

Paul Dédalus is preparing to leave Tajikistan. He remembers... His childhood in Roubaix... his mother's attacks of madness... the bond that united him and his brother Ivan, a devout and violent child... He remembers... Turning sixteen... his father, the inconsolable widower... His trip to the USSR where a clandestine mission led him to offer up his own identity to a young Russian... He remembers himself at nineteen, his sister Delphine, his cousin Bob, the parties with Penelope, Mehdi and Kovalki, the friend who was to betray him... He remembers his years as a student in Paris, his meeting with Doctor Behanzin, his growing vocation for anthropology... Above all, Paul remembers Esther. She was the heart of his life. Gently, "a fanatic heart".