Partly memoirs, partly fiction, all quest to understand himself, his father and make sense of the man that was the circus master of the first 15 years of Alexandre Jardin's life.

Alexandre Jardin, a wildly popular French writer, who became a "name" and won prizes with his first book, Bille en tête, the story of a very young man who romances and becomes the lover of an older friend of his mother. His career as a writer started with a bang and never slowed down after that. Still, we find in this homage to his father, this Zubial, this crazy but lovable man, that Alexandre never got over losing his father. No child really does I think, what makes this tale interesting is the talent in which it is told, the insane, crazy, free lifestyle that the Jardin family engage in. Alexandre revisited this in "Le Roman des Jardins" a few years later.

A quick and intense read. ( )