"This is all the raw urgency of female adolescent sexuality: its energy and intensity, the push-pull of its excitement, its dangers and glories, building to a coming explosion."—Kate Millett, author ofMother Millett

"Read it in one sitting. . . . Literally breathless. This first-person torch song for 'the pink brute' reminds us why French schoolgirls are the emblem for naughty passions as literary classics."—Sarah Schulman, author ofThe Gentrification of the Mind

"School-aged, yet sage in their desires, Thérèse and Isabelle called forth an endless night—a dark and delicate space for them to explore the complexity of their love. I have waited a very long time to slip back into the unexpurgated, delicious darkness with these iconic lesbian lovers."—Amber Dawn, author of How Poetry Saved My Life

Thérèse and Isabelle is the tale of two boarding school girls in love. In 1966 when it was originally published in France, the text was censored because of its explicit depiction of young homosexuality. With this publication, the original, unexpurgated text—a stunning literary portrayal of female desire and sexuality—is available to a US audience for the first time. Included is an afterword by Michael Lucey, professor of French and comparative literature at the University of California, Berkeley.

Violette Leduc (1907–1972) has been referred to as "France's greatest unknown writer." Admired by Jean Genet, Nathalie Sarraute, and Albert Camus, Leduc was championed by Simone de Beauvoir when she published her scandalous autobiographyLa Batarde (1964).

Marcel Aymé's most celebrated tale provides the title of this collection of ten short stories. The excellent Monsieur Dutilleul is able to penetrate walls, but never exploits his gift until his tyrannical boss drives him to desperate measures. How will the unassuming clerk adjust to a glamorous life of crime?