In many of his novels Simenon shows a certain obsession with the destructive power of alcohol on people's life. So he does here, in the novel about the magician Antoine and his wife Julie, the ever-waiting, to whom Antoine only returns for good after she dies. But even more than about alcoholism, this book is about its origin, the loneliness and the powerlessness of a man facing a terrifying fate.
In many of his novels Simenon shows a certain obsession with the destructive power of alcohol on people's life. So he does here, in the novel about the magician Antoine and his wife Julie, the ever-waiting, to whom Antoine only returns for good after she dies. But even more than about alcoholism, this book is about its origin, the loneliness and the powerlessness of a man facing a terrifying fate.