First Fiction Fridays: Rewrite by Temenuga Trifonova

What: Rewrite (Now Or Never, 2014)Who: Temenuga Trifonova is Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Studies at York University in Toronto. She is the author of several books and numerous scholarly articles, and her first feature film Man of Glass won the Cinematic Vision Award at the 2013 Amsterdam Film Festival. Rewrite is her first novel.Why You Need to Read This Now: Rewrite is an impressive piece of writing. Ms. Trifonova’s sharp wit, narrative grasp, quirky sense of humour and outstanding intellect are apparent on every page, not to mention her remarkable command of the English language. The novel, an intellectual mystery, follows Bruno Leblon, a history lecturer at a Paris university. During a six week long winter break, he tries to do research at the Public Library for his new book—a history of his family, one of the last aristocratic families in France. Bruno is shocked to find out that another library patron—“X”—is manipulating the historical evidence—late 19th century photographs of the Leblon family—that Bruno is using in his research. Abandoning his book, Bruno assumes the role of a detective and embarks on an investigation of the mysterious “X” and of fictional aristocratic persona “X” seems to have assumed. Reality and fantasy, past and present, begin to blend together until one can’t be discerned from the other. Is Bruno simply imagining the whole thing? Or is there a larger conspiracy at work? Is the entire story simply the imaginings of a would-be theatre director? Rewrite leaves these questions open for the reader to decide.What Others are Saying:“…encouragement towards rumination paired with the reader’s privy position inside Bruno’s disturbed mind makes for an experience that is jarringly surreal. The book is a real mindbender…” – Publishers’ Weekly, October 2014*****Thanks to Chris at Now Or Never for sharing the thrilling Rewrite with us.