An international best-seller with more than one million copies in print and a winner of France&apos;s Prix Goncourt, <b>The Lover</b> has been acclaimed by critics all over the world since its first publication in 1984.<br /><br />Set in the prewar Indochina of Marguerite Duras&apos;s childhood, this is the haunting tale of a tumultuous affair between an adolescent French girl and her Chinese lover. In spare yet luminous prose, Duras evokes life on the margins of Saigon in the waning days of France&apos;s colonial empire, and its representation in the passionate relationship between two unforgettable outcasts.<br /><br />Long unavailable in hardcover, this edition of <b>The Lover</b> includes a new introduction by Maxine Hong Kingston that looks back at Duras&apos;s world from an intriguing new perspective--that of a visitor to Vietnam today.