Retreat from Love

Colette (1873-1945) was the foremost French woman author of her time. Retreat From Love, first published in 1907, was the first of her novels to be written without the collaboration of her husband Willy"", from whom she had recently separated. In an isolated farmhouse in the Jura, Claudine awaits her husband Renaud's return from a Swiss sanatorium. She distracts herself by encouraging her young friend Annie to recount salacious episodes from her love life. When Renaud's homosexual son Marcel arrives, Claudine acts as matchmaker, and then bitterly regrets the ensuing fiasco. ""An important book in the Colette canon."" - TLS.