Julia Deck's Geometries

ABSTRACT:Second novels are often where literary careers are made, or on the contrary where they founder. Julia Deck's Le Triangle d'hiver (2014) amply fulfills the rich promise of her first novel, Viviane Élisabeth Fauville (2012), putting on display a pleasing lightness of touch and an impressive degree of narrative confidence. That latter quality serves Deck particularly well, for the story she tells contains more than a few twists. Things are constantly in flux in this novel, and appearances are in some ways more reliable than realities. Even the most attentive of readers is likely to nonplussed at some point. But that sort of narrative sleight of hand is part of Deck's wager, of course; and like any successful feat of prestidigitation, it relies on our willingness to be fooled.