Riverstone Around the Globe is a new book club at McCandless Crossing which centralizes global literatures, works in translation, and highlights from the Booker and International Booker prizes. Whether you’re looking to broaden your literary horizons, or otherwise want to read novels you wouldn’t normally find all over social media, this book club is a great introduction to books outside the States.

This book club is led by Riverstone bookseller, Sarah.

The June pick is A Leopard-Skin Hat by Anne Serre. Need to order a copy of the book? You can do so here.

About the book:

A quintessential early novel about an intense friendship, by the winner of the 2020 Prix Goncourt de la nouvelle.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE

A Leopard-Skin Hat may be the French writer Anne Serre’s most moving novel yet. Hailed in Le Point as a “masterpiece of simplicity, emotion and elegance,” it is the story of an intense friendship between “the Narrator” and his close childhood friend, Fanny, who suffers from profound psychological disorders. A series of short scenes paints the portrait of a strong-willed and tormented young woman battling many demons, and of the narrator’s loving and anguished attachment to her. Anne Serre poignantly depicts the bewildering back and forth between hope and despair involved in such a relationship, while playfully calling into question the very form of the novel. Written in the aftermath of the death of the author’s little sister, A Leopard-Skin Hat is both the celebration of a tragically foreshortened life and a valedictory farewell, written in Anne Serre’s signature style.