Dua's Monthly Read for February 2026
“After an unexplained absence of several years, a man walks back into the life of a woman and their young son. Right away, something about him feels off. He’s unpredictable, almost feral, and when he insists they all go together to Les Roches, an abandoned house in the mountains, a sense of dread creeps in and never leaves us, the readers.
“Later, we find out that this is the same house where the man lived his brutal teenage years with his own violent and deranged father. At this point, I was getting The Shining vibes, and the ending of this tense novel is no less climactic.
“I should probably warn you: this is a dark book, even by my standards. And yet, there’s also real beauty here. The language is cinematic and poetic, which translator Frank Wynne captures perfectly in English.
“Jean-Baptiste Del Amo, one of France’s most exciting contemporary writers, so cleverly illustrates how violence can be passed down from one generation to the next – especially from fathers to sons. I was on the edge of my seat from beginning to end and I’m still thinking about this fragile family and the legacy of inherited trauma. The hope at the end of this novel rests on breaking this cycle.” – Dua Lipa
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