The Woman of the Pharisees

Mauriac's deft descriptions of the Pian family in early 20th century Bordeaux comes to us through Louis, the young son, but centers on his tragically pious step-mother, Brigitte Pian. Every character (even the narrator) is pulled apart for the reader, with their best and worst characteristics equally spread out on the page, and their physical and mental flaws held up for laughter and judgement. However no character is given as thorough a treatment as the easy to see through, but impossible to understand, Brigitte. A dark (but sometimes funny) novel that Maruiac wrote during the German occupation of France in the 1940s, this work hits on family, religion, education, love, passion, hypocrisy, and class issues in equal measures. Best of show more all, however, is the voice of our narrator, bringing these stories to us from his vantage point as a grown, embittered man, who realizes how deliciously untrustworthy his narration is and who comes to us with his receipts. Pretty impossible to put down. show less

The writing was excellent and added so much interest to the story of a woman who felt she was living a very religious life. The ending was such a disappointment that I felt a real letdown. The copy I read was published by Noonday Press in 1964

self-righteous austerity