Bonjour Tristesse, Françoise Sagan

When you are seventeen years old everything is black and white to you. This also goes for Céline, who is on holiday with her father Raymond in the South of France for the Summer.

Her father and Céline have a good bond, but he does not set a good example for her, as he is hardly a parent and is more concerned with his latest girlfriend.

When Anne, an old friend of Céline's late mother comes to visit, Raymond is so taken with her that he ditches his last girlfriend and asks Anne to marry him.

Céline knows on one hand that living with Anne will be good for them as Anne has much more sense and class than they have, but on the other hand she resents that their lives will change.

So Céline comes up with a plan do drive her father and Anne apart, desperate enough to work and ruthless enough to be final.

Françoise Sagan published this book when she was only eightteen years old. And it is hard to imagine that somebody who is almost still a teenager could have written such clean and almost elegant prose.

Céline is not a very nice girl, but at the same time you cannot blame her for how she behaves, her father gives her no example at all. I loved how the novel is set up and you know something will happen, although in a way Céline never wanted.

It is no wonder that Bonjour Tristesse is considered a classic, and it is still as fresh as though it had been written yesterday.

Originally published in 1954