In this novel, Amélie Nothomb seems to grow at its height the figures of Beauty and Ugliness in the people of the beautiful and sublime Ethel and horrible and monstrous Epiphanes. The latter became friends with the beauty who has decidedly all virtues, besides the beauty, and he falls deeply in love and secretly. Ethel will she love her love in turn? That is the question. With this passion he discovered in him for the first time in his life he feels grow wings and manage to take revenge of plague on the world, becoming famous for its ugliness. As always with Amélie Nothomb, the pen is removed and sublime, sentences are funny and incisive, black humor makes fly. Climate misadventures of Epiphanes in his hotel in Japan are really funny (it smells lived with the author!). The affre of Love, the torments and noble sentiments which it imposes are masterfully described.
