Sylvie Germain traces a century in the life of the Peniel family and the cycle of birth and death, triumph and loss, madness and passion―from the Franco-Prussian War to World War II―that envelops and buffets their lives. Blending the historical with the supernatural, the comic with the grotesque, the lyrical with the brutal, Sylvie Germain tells the story of humanity's strivings and vanity, of the profound injustices that govern our relations, and of the fundamental strength that allows us ultimately to triumph over carnage and degradation.
