Bonjour Tristesse

Twentieth-Century Classics, a new hardback series from Penguin Classics: the era’s greatest books with cover artwork from its most celebrated photographers, bound in signature eau-de-nil cloth.

Published when she was only nineteen, Françoise Sagan’s astonishing first novel Bonjour Tristesse became an instant bestseller. It tells the story of Cécile, who leads a carefree life with her widowed father and his young mistresses until, one hot summer on the Riviera, he decides to remarry – with devastating consequences. In A Certain Smile Dominique, a young woman bored with her lover, begins an encounter with an older man that unfolds in unexpected and troubling ways. These two acerbically witty and delightfully amoral tales about the nature of love are shimmering masterpieces of cool-headed, brilliant observation.

Cover photograph by Jerry Cooke