Just a Little Dinner

“Full of soul, with characters who are real, relatable and flawed. I loved Just a Little Dinner.” Ceci Browning, THE TIMES

-- Laurence Caracalla * Le Figaro Littéraire *

In the cinema and the theatre, feasts that descend into disaster are a distinctly French specialty. Cécile Tlili manages to reinvent this tradition with her very first novel.

The dramatic tension between the two couples is electrifying as the evening takes its unexpected turns.

“In the cinema and the theatre, feasts that descend into disaster are a distinctly French speciality. Cécile Tlili manages to reinvent this tradition with her very first novel.” PARIS MATCH

“A hurtful and sadly all-too commonplace human comedy, wonderfully described by an author we will hear a lot more from.” Laurance Caracalla, LE FIGARO LITTÉRAIRE

“The dramatic tension between the two couples is electrifying as the evening takes its unexpected turns.” LE MONDE DES LIVRES

-- Florence Bouchy * Le Monde des Livres *

Devilishly tasty

-- Margaux Morasso

If, however, you have room on your plate for only one dinner-party novel this summer, I’d suggest Just A Little Dinner

-- Mia Levitin

It is yet another testament to the importance of small presses for fiction in translation. Though I had the characters’ company for a single evening, I savoured every moment.

-- Mia Levitin

I loved Just a Little Dinner by Cécile Tlili, a newly translated tale that offers a searingly contemporary take on the Huis Clos story.

-- Ceci Browning

What makes Just a Little Dinner so brilliant is the steady revelation of how the lives of the four characters, each relatable and inherently flawed, are intertwined, in many more ways than we see on the surface. It has a similar flavour to Vincenzo Latronico’s novel Perfection, hinting at how the expectations we have for our lives rarely line up with reality, but is richer and meatier. After finishing the book, I felt gloriously full.

-- Ceci Brow