Creo en el enemigo porque todos los días y todas las noches se cruza en mi camino. El enemigo es aquel que, desde el interior, destruye lo que merece la pena. Es aquel que te muestra la decrepitud contenida en cada realidad.

This very short novel is exquisite. In less than 100 pages, Nothomb captures the reader into a mellow thriller that takes places in a waiting area of an airport. The plot is not very complicated; the main character’s, Jerome, flight is delayed so he is stuck in the waiting area, when trying to read a book, a man, Textor Texel sits next to him. Textor is the annoying person we have all met that wants to chat with you, even if you don’t want to talk to anyone. Without any reciprocity from Jerome, Textor begins a monologue where the tells his life’s major events to Jerome; these include childhood traumas, obsessive behaviors, rapes and even murders. At first Jerome only delivers short answers and indifferent comments, but as the novel progresses his unconscious betrays him and, to his disgrace, he is absorbed in Textor’s conversation.

Nothomb is a genius writing short novels, she delivers a clean cut story with characters just profound enough for readers to relate to them. The structure of the novel is such that in every page, she delivers a hint (the specific date of an event, how the characters are dressed, why they are waiting…) or a different layer of the character’s personalities and past ghosts or the precise word to describe a particular feeling. At one point, without warning, the tone become ominous and novel becomes impossible to put down. The novel is so short, that every sentence is worth reading twice. Once I finished, I read it again, to look for clues that I had missed and enjoy such a delicate prose (without rushing to see what happens). I truly recommend this novel, I wish I could say more, but it’s worth a read. I will definitely read more works by Amélie Nothomb.

About Amélie Nothomb

Nothomb was born in Belgium in 1966 although some sources cite she was born in 1967 in Kobe, Japan. Having a diplomat father, she spent most of her first years in Asia. She studied philology at the Free University of Brussels and published her first novel in 1992, since then, she has written over 30 novels, most of them very short. In 2015 she was named a Baroness.

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