Lara Vergnaud

"The acclaimed Moroccan author's debut novel, this stunning portrait of the world of sex work describes its sordid reality with beautiful, poetic prose. Available now for the first time in English, Demoiselles of Numidia offers an intimate glimpse into the lives of young women working in a Casablanca brothel-their relationships with each other and with their pimps, their dramas, and the rare moments of happiness that bloom in this violent underbelly....

"In this gothic tale reminiscent of Faulkner's Light in August, a young woman's journals divulge the horrible secrets of a wealthy family in late nineteenth-century rural France. Before he is called to bless the body of a woman at the nearby asylum, Father Gabriel receives a strange, troubling confession: hidden under her dress he will find the notebooks that contain Rose's harrowing story. At fourteen years old, Rose is sold to a rich man by her...

"Sidi lives a hermetic life as a bee whisperer, tending to his beloved 'girls' on the outskirts of the desolate North African village of Nawa. He wakes one morning to find that something has attacked one of his beehives, brutally killing every inhabitant. Heartbroken, he soon learns that a mysterious swarm of vicious hornets committed the mass murder—but where did they come from, and how can he stop them? If he is going to unravel this mystery...

For centuries, the women in Ninon Moise's family have been afflicted by obscure, inexplicable medical phenomena. Seventeen-year-old Ninon is no exception to this bizarre family inheritance, and she wakes one morning with a debilitating and excruciatingly painful response to touch on her arms. Unlike her forebears, Ninon refuses to passively accept her cursed fate and rebels against the indifferent medical professionals who dismiss her condition as...