An Adoration by Nancy Huston
Translated from the French by Nancy Huston

• Bibliotheques Municipales Geneva, Switzerland

The characters of An Adoration participate in a legal hearing of a highly singular variety, unfolding outside of real time and place. They each give testimony in front of a mysterious magistrate who turns out to be none other than the reader herself or himself, presenting their respective and often contradictory versions of the death - and life - of a certain Cosmo.
Among the witnesses are a number of dead people, the novelist, a Lebanese cedar, a wisteria, a footbridge, and a gorgeous Algerian knife (probably the murder weapon). Cosmo is the only character whose voice is never heard, but his portrait is gradually sketched out and coloured in by the stories and memories of others in his village.
Actor, humorist, dreamer and poet, this man whose charm was as irresistible on stage as off manages through his shortened life to be loved by numerous women without making them jealous of each other. His charisma is such that he reveals to each what she loves most about herself…and about himself as well. But Cosmo's capacity for empathy with people, things and nature will also turn out to be his Achille's heel. He is so gifted at mirroring others that he loses sight of himself.

Nancy Huston was born in Calgary, Alberta. In 1973 she went to Paris for a year of study abroad and never moved back. Her previous books have won the Prix Goncourt des Lyceen, the Prix du Livre -Inter, the Prix Elle (Quebec) and the Governor General's Award. The Mark of the Angel was an international bestseller, which won the Grand Prix des Lectrices de Elle, the Canadian Jewish Book Award, the Torgi award, and was short listed for the Giller Prize. Nancy Huston lives in Paris with her husband, the writer Tzvetan Todorov, and their two children.