With the Animals%E2%80%A8

In her debut novel, Swiss author Revaz paints a grim portrait of a provincial farm under the rule of Paul, a petty tyrant who feels more compassion for his cows than he does for his family. Beset by his mute wife (whom he loathingly refers to as "Vulva") and a brood of children, Paul creates a fiefdom of alienation and neverending labor. But the arrival of Georges, a Portuguese farmhand, begins to threaten Paul's authority and undermine his austere worldview. But in the end, the simple episodic plot is of less interest than simply listening to Paul. Full of malapropisms, neologisms, unsettling rhythms and convoluted syntax, Paul's speech creates a vivid and brutal idiolect that is as refreshing as it is disturbing. For all the misanthropy of Paul's thoughts%E2%80%94he often has to struggle to remember that Vulva is a person%E2%80%94he manages moments of minor poetry. Coming across an earthworm, Paul muses that "Some folk never turn a hair but smash straight down with the flat of the spade, and there's some slice clean through and kill with never a thought, never allowing any notion that critters might have stories too, stories just like ours, only we're bigger." Like Paul, this novel has much to offer anyone willing to endure the darkness long enough to find it. (May)