True Copies
- Publisher
- Signature Editions
- Initial publish date
- Nov 1996
- Category
- General
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780921833475
- Publish Date
- Nov 1996
- List Price
- $14.95
Classroom Resources
Where to buy it
Description
Winner of the 1990 Grand Prix du Livre de Montréal, True Copies is an evocative tale of love, loss and deception. Claire, a young Québecoise, has been asked to retrieve a computer disk containing essential details of a potentially lucrative translation program her husband has been developing. When she discovers that the disk is missing from the research lab, she begins a quest that involves her in complicated intrigues, leading her through the Silicon Valley and into the streets of Dashiell Hammett's San Francisco.
About the author
Monique LaRue is a writer of considerable renown both in Canada and abroad. She has published six novels for which she has received numerous distinctions. She won the Grand Prix du livre de Montréal for Copies conformes (translated and published in English as True Copies); she won the Grand Prix Littéraire du Journal de Montréal for La Démarche du crabe; La Gloire du Cassiodore won the Governor General’s Award for Fiction in 2002; and L’Œil de Marquise, published in 2009, won the inaugural Prix Jacques-Cartier du roman de langue française.
Monique LaRue est une écrivaine de grande renommée, tant au Canada qu’à l’étranger. Romancière, essayiste et philosophe, elle est titulaire d’un doctorat de La Sorbonne et enseignante en littérature au Cégep Édouard-Montpetit depuis de nombreuses années. Elle a publié six romans qui ont mérité plusieurs honneurs. Elle a ainsi reçu le Grand Prix du livre de Montréal pour Copies conformes (traduit et publié en anglais sous le titre de True Copies); elle a également remporté le Grand Prix Littéraire du Journal de Montréal pour La Démarche du crabe. La Gloire du Cassiodore est couronné par le prix littéraire du Gouverneur général en 2002; et son roman, L’Œil de Marquise, publié en 2009, s’est vu décerné le premier Prix Jacques-Cartier du roman de langue française.
Excerpt: True Copies (by (author) Monique LaRue)
The place where we're born insidiously leads us to death. The occasional need to leave our native city is probably just the manifestation of a keen sense of place. One that made me feel, now, that I loved the city of my childhood, the humble places where simple people knew nothing about doubt and travels.
To live continually at the point of impact of two languages turns the mind into a kind of monochrome. I knew now that it was essential to sojourn in one of those golden cities where people live, speak and die without even an idea of the happiness inherent in living, speaking and dying in a powerful, unique language. Otherwise, we might forget that whatever the language, there are words that elude us all our life.
Editorial Reviews
“True Copies is a suspense-filled mystery thriller, complete with a murder, obscure messages and lethal espionage in the computer industry. LaRue cleverly interweaves references to Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon into her story. The connection, of course, is highly appropriate, because in Hammett's novel the statuette of the Maltese falcon turns out to be a replica rather than the original. True Copies is an accomplished and engaging work of fiction which shares the social realism of Gabrielle Roy and Yves Beauchemin.”
—The Globe & Mail