The Power of Flies
By Lydie Salvayre
Dalkey Archive Press $12.95

It’s possible that this short, misanthropic novel carries more weight in its original French than it does in English, if only because of the echoes of Camus’ novel The Fall.

Like that book, this takes the form of a confession, though the details of the crime of its unnamed narrator remain, for most of the book, tantalisingly undisclosed.

With all this vagueness, you could accuse Lydie Salvayre of wilful inscrutability. But by keeping us in the dark, she forces us to lean closer to her creation, a haughty museum guide, as he holds forth on the iniquities of the world. Surprisingly, his single-minded negativity becomes almost endearing. How could we not warm to someone who dismisses lovemaking as “deceit and buffoonery’’?