The Strangers in the House (New York Review Books Classics)
"The greatest literary discovery I have made in recent time is Georges Simenon--his 'hard' novels, such asDirty SnowandThe Strangers in the House. So impressed was I by these books that I was determined to write one. The result isChristine Falls." --Benjamin Black (John Banville),Publishers Weekly"Most of Simenon's novels are short, 200 pages or less, short enough to be read in one or two sittings. His style is spare but unusually potent. If you want to learn how to use adjectives - which is to say, with economy and precision - read Simenon. His skill at creating a sense of place is uncanny. When you finishThe Strangers in the House,the memory of the dark and rainy streets of Moulins, the town where the story is set, stays with you palpably." —Philadelphia Inquirer"This is not a Maigret but one of the French master's romans durs and is quite simply a masterpiece." --John Banville“Attention should be paid to the New York Review of Books' continuing reissues of Georges Simenon. Simenon was legendary both for his literary skill–four or five books every year for 40 years–and his sexual capacity, at least to hear him tell it.  What we can speak of with some certainty are the novels, which are tough, rigorously unsentimental and full of rage, duplicity and, occasionally, justice. Simenon's tone and dispassionate examination of humanity was echoed by Patricia Highsmith, who dispensed with the justice. So far, the Review has publishedTropic Moon, The Man Who Watched Trains Go By, Red Lights, Dirty SnowandThree Bedrooms in Manhattan;The Strangers in the Housecomes out in November. Try one, and you'll want to read more.” –The Palm Beach Post'A master storyteller ... Simenon gave to the puzzle story a humanity that it had never had before'–Daily Telegraph"The most extraordinary literary phenomenon of the twentieth century." –Julian Symons“Theromans dursare extraordinary: tough, bleak, offhandedly violent, suffused with guilt and bitterness, redolent of place (Simenon is unsurpassed as a scenesetter), utterly unsentimental, frightening in the pitilessness of their gaze, yet wonderfully entertaining.  They are also more philosophically profound than any of the fiction of Camus or Sartre, and far less self-conscious.  This is existentialism with a backbone of tempered steel.”–John Banville,The New Republic"This is what attracts and holds me in him. He writes for `the vast public,' to be sure, but delicate and refined readers find something for them too as soon as they begin to take him seriously. He makes one reflect; and this is close to being the height of art; how superior he is in this to those heavy novelists who do not spare us a single commentary! Simenon sets forth a particular fact, perhaps of general interest; but he is careful not to generalize; that is up to the reader."–André Gide“[Simenon] digs right inside his protagonists heads, in ways so specific that his characters have a forceful and very convincing individuality.  He makes crime fascinating, even attractive.”–The Dominion Post(New Zealand)