L Affaire

"Johnson is more droll than Henry James, to whom she's been compared, and she's as witty as a modern-day Voltaire. Vraiment, L'Affaire, c'est irresistible!”—Publishers Weekly Amy Hawkins, a Palo Alto girl who made herself a dot-com fortune, goes to France to get a sheen of sophistication and, perhaps, to have an affair that will ruffle her all-too-steady heart. She starts her quest in a glamorous resort in the French Alps, amid an assortment of aristocrats and ski enthusiasts. But when two of the hotel’s guests are swept away by an avalanche, Adrian’s children—young, old, legitimate, illegitimate—assemble to protect their interests, feuding under the competing laws of the British, American, and French systems. Amy, already suspect because she is American, steps in to assist, and unintentionally sets in motion a series of events that spotlight ancient national differences, customs, and laws. Filled with love, sex, death, and travel, L’Affaire is National Book Award finalist Diane Johnson at her very best.

This is the first overview of the scandal that took down CIA director and the much-idolized General David Petraeus. As with all major scandals, there are back stories to the Petraeus Affair and they are revealed here.

""A supertanker goes missing in the Mozambique Channel. A month later, it is rediscovered far out at sea by the Bourbon-Busset family, descendants of thirty kings and at least one pope, who just happen to be yachting in the neighborhood. Over the objections of their own crew and the American government, the Bourbon-Bussets carry the tanker into Mauritius, claim a quarter of its value in admiralty court - and win the case. After the president of Togo disappears from his mistress's bed in the middle of the night and is mysteriously restored to her before morning, he subsequently makes major alterations to Togo's annual budget and foreign policy. Fortunately, he doesn't have to push them through alone. The other key men in his government also appear to have something to hide and thus something to gain by following his lead. Although they may be more forthcoming about exactly what they are hiding with the Chinese ambassador. In central Africa, British reporter Tony Henderson has stumbled onto something unusual: revolutionaries who not only don't want publicity for their cause, they actually go to great lengths to avoid it. He is gently but firmly shooed away from potential hot spots and told to go report on local agricultural complaints instead, much to his chagrin. The Ugandan government may be on the verge of collapse, with a massive popular movement to restore the traditional kingdoms underway, and no one will tell him about it. On the other side of the world, Dr. Robert Saul, a clever biochemist with a beautiful but vapid wife and a taste for ignoring patients and perjuring himself in his spare time, is being courted by a major pharmaceutical firm. His unpleasant personality is canceled out by one very important consideration: he has developed a revolutionary antiviral called VIPER, which not only cures the common cold, but also HIV and everything in between. The clinical trials look promising. In another twenty years, AIDS will have been consigned to the history books. However, the Bourbon-Bussets have other ideas. In their opinion, twenty years is too long to wait, and any price too high to pay for public access to the vaccine. Armed with a ready supply of cash and a creative approach to private property, and with their machinations stretching from Swaziland to Rome to Ciudad Juarez, they go after Dr. Saul themselves. They want him to release the patent for the antiviral into the public domain. And if he proves uncooperative, well, then, they will have to find a way to persuade him."" The price of failure is twenty million dead. Or more.

Le personnage principal a décidé de se lancer en affaires et de lancer sa propre agence, comme détective. Mais pour n’être engagé que dans les amours, comme ici la spécialisation. Dans le premier cas, il est nécessaire de vérifier l’objet, une jolie fille, pour la stabilité morale. Pour ce faire, notre responsable de l’agence prend une chambre d’hôtel et une table dans le restaurant en bas. Après le souper... Et ce qui s’est passé après le souper, lu dans le livre.

Emile Gaboriau, ne a Saujon le 9 novembre 1832 et decede a Paris le 28 septembre 1873, fut un chroniqueur et ecrivain francais. Il est considere comme le pere du roman policier. D'abord clerc de notaire puis engage dans l'armee francaise qu'il quitte rapidement, il devint ensuite secretaire d'un magistrat avant finalement de s'orienter vers une carriere de chroniqueur dans les colonnes de plusieurs journaux de la capitale. Tout le monde a lu le roman d'Emile Gaboriau, nous n'avons donc a rappeler ici que son immense succes, L'Affaire Lerouge a ete le point de depart d'une foule de romans et de drames judiciaires, qui, a l'exemple de leur modele, mais a un degre moindre, ont captive la faveur d'un public avide de ce genre d'emotions. Le crime est histoire des peuples primitifs et le roman des nations civilisees. L' uvre d'Emile Gaboriau etait indiquee pour le theatre. Les evenements, les caracteres, certains conflits de passions, se pretent merveilleusement a la scene.

Diane Johnson returns with another expatriate comedy of manners in this tale of a young dot-com executive from California who sets off for Europe to find culture, her roots, and maybe a cause to devote her considerable fortune to. When Amy checks into one of the finest small hotels in the French Alps - a hotel noted for skiing and for cooking lessons - she encounters a memorable cast of Euro trash aristocrats and ski enthusiasts. She has no plans to fall in love. But on the first afternoon, she is nearly swept away by an avalanche. Johnson's unerring ear for the cadences of the two cultures, her wit, and her shrewd insight into contemporary manners make her latest work a treat for fans of transatlantic relations. "If one were to cross Jane Austen and Henry James, the result would be Diane Johnson." (San Francisco Chronicle)