- Jubilee offer: spend £10 or more on any product sold by Amazon.co.uk on or before June 6 and you can buy The Diamond Jubilee A Classical Celebration Album for just £2.50 Here's how (terms and conditions apply)
| ||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Jezebel for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Special Offers and Product Promotions
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Review
` Nemirovsky's tale [...] rings more contemporary bells than we might think at first'.
--Independent on Sunday
`slender, but engrossing, novel' --Financial Times
'a fascinating portrait of paranoid self-absorption.'
--Financial Times
`Fast-paced and highly dramatic, it offers a fascinating glimpse into an inter-war world of privilege, wealth and Darwinian social combat'
--New Statesman
`Fast-paced..., it offers a fascinating glimpse into an inter-war world of privilege, wealth and Darwinian social combat' --New Statesman
--Independent on Sunday
`slender, but engrossing, novel' --Financial Times
'a fascinating portrait of paranoid self-absorption.'
--Financial Times
`Fast-paced and highly dramatic, it offers a fascinating glimpse into an inter-war world of privilege, wealth and Darwinian social combat'
--New Statesman
`Fast-paced..., it offers a fascinating glimpse into an inter-war world of privilege, wealth and Darwinian social combat' --New Statesman
Book Description
A dramatic tale of murder and passion in 1930s France from the author of David Golder and Suite Française
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Once again Vintage are giving us a treat with another great tale form the late Irene Nemirovsky. Nemirovsky had the great talent of getting under the skin of her main characters, and to a certain extent ours.
To be honest I couldn't put this book down, it immediately captivated and held me from the very beginning and is sure to be a success. Our story opens with Gladys Eysenach on trial for the murder of her younger lover. With the trial concluded we are then taken on a trip back into different periods of time, where we learn more about Gladys, what she was like and how vain she is. With the current plethora of adverts offering men as well as women the chance to stay looking 'young' this book is very modern and will bound to be on many a reading groups list. Gladys herself just wants to be loved as an attractive woman and can't abide aging and losing her looks, but in her case she is prepared to go to extreme measures to keep hidden her real age. As the story progresses you go from feeling sorry for Gladys, to eventually reviling her, as more and more becomes apparent about her vanity and selfishness, and why she really committed murder. Sandra Smith who translated this is also provides a short introduction where you can see that this book in some ways mirrors Irene Nemirovsky's relationship with her own mother.
All in all this is a fantastic book that you will be bound to come back to time and time again.
To be honest I couldn't put this book down, it immediately captivated and held me from the very beginning and is sure to be a success. Our story opens with Gladys Eysenach on trial for the murder of her younger lover. With the trial concluded we are then taken on a trip back into different periods of time, where we learn more about Gladys, what she was like and how vain she is. With the current plethora of adverts offering men as well as women the chance to stay looking 'young' this book is very modern and will bound to be on many a reading groups list. Gladys herself just wants to be loved as an attractive woman and can't abide aging and losing her looks, but in her case she is prepared to go to extreme measures to keep hidden her real age. As the story progresses you go from feeling sorry for Gladys, to eventually reviling her, as more and more becomes apparent about her vanity and selfishness, and why she really committed murder. Sandra Smith who translated this is also provides a short introduction where you can see that this book in some ways mirrors Irene Nemirovsky's relationship with her own mother.
All in all this is a fantastic book that you will be bound to come back to time and time again.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Opening any book to a court scene is enough to have me itching to pop a book down, I don't tend to get on with courtroom dramas. `Jezebel' by Irène Némirovsky starts in such a very place however rather than draw the whole drama out and devote a chapter to a witness the whole event is done in 40 pages with witnesses and intrigue page upon page. Why are we in court? Well Irène Némirovsky's protagonist of `Jezebel', the elegant and beautiful Gladys Eysenach, is on trial for the murder of a much younger man.
I'm not going to tell you whether Gladys is guilty or not, despite the fact that you actually find out her plea and indeed her verdict within the first few pages, because it might still take something away from the book. I was slightly baffled that you knew so much so early on, only Irène Némirovsky has great plans for the reader, you much first see where we find Gladys and then you must go on the journey from her childhood and through society, marriages, liaisons and tragedy (the book has an intense charge throughout) to get to the event that found her in this courtroom. It is through this that Irène Némirovsky creates a tale about a woman obsessed with the days of her youth and how as time goes by age creeps upon her and for someone like Gladys Eysenach this is the cruellest thing imaginable.
What is sometimes wonderful about going to a book that sounds intriguing and yet you have low expectations of (especially if you didn't like the first book you read of theirs) is that when you then really enjoy it it's almost all the more enjoyable. This was the case for me with `Jezebel'. I read it in two sittings and the mixture of the murder and how I was sure it couldn't just be as clear a crime as Irène Némirovsky originally makes it look and the tale of a woman's rise through beauty and old ages betrayal of that was a fascinating read and one that I would highly recommend.
I'm not going to tell you whether Gladys is guilty or not, despite the fact that you actually find out her plea and indeed her verdict within the first few pages, because it might still take something away from the book. I was slightly baffled that you knew so much so early on, only Irène Némirovsky has great plans for the reader, you much first see where we find Gladys and then you must go on the journey from her childhood and through society, marriages, liaisons and tragedy (the book has an intense charge throughout) to get to the event that found her in this courtroom. It is through this that Irène Némirovsky creates a tale about a woman obsessed with the days of her youth and how as time goes by age creeps upon her and for someone like Gladys Eysenach this is the cruellest thing imaginable.
What is sometimes wonderful about going to a book that sounds intriguing and yet you have low expectations of (especially if you didn't like the first book you read of theirs) is that when you then really enjoy it it's almost all the more enjoyable. This was the case for me with `Jezebel'. I read it in two sittings and the mixture of the murder and how I was sure it couldn't just be as clear a crime as Irène Némirovsky originally makes it look and the tale of a woman's rise through beauty and old ages betrayal of that was a fascinating read and one that I would highly recommend.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I enjoyed this very much, the writing style is lovely, although I read the English translation and not the original French. It did however start to get repetitive in certain parts towards the end, but I would recommend it. It takes place in an age which no longer exists but it is also an evaluation on the relationship between mothers and daughters.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A Tale of Obsession and Desperation
Irene Nemirovsky's novel 'Jezebel' is the tale of Gladys Eysenach, a beautiful, but ageing woman, whose beauty is fading and with it, her power over men. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Susie B
A mother from hell
This French novel from the mid-1930s [newly translated in 2010] is one of the author's attempts to deal in writing with her horrible mother. Read more
Published 4 months ago by P. A. Doornbos
hmmm...
I was hoping for something great as the premise was promising but for me this book never got off the ground. Read more
Published 16 months ago by Ms. K. Thomas
Intense and disturbing
Another great short novel by Nemirovsky...and I have only 2 left to read now...sigh..
The story focusses on a woman - the Jezebel of the title - and her life. Read more
The story focusses on a woman - the Jezebel of the title - and her life. Read more
Published 20 months ago by B. Murray
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
