Philippe Besson’s Lie With Me is equal parts poignant tribute and glaring warning.
It’s Besson’s tribute to the teenage lover to whom the book is dedicated, although it’s unclear just how much of the narrative is novel and how much fact. As with all good literature, it doesn’t really matter. The first two-thirds of the story chronicle their relationship: from furtive glances and idle daydreams to the moment of first contact. The tension is already such that this moment — after recess on a winter’s day as the narrator roots through his bag for a biology textbook – is both banal and deeply thrilling. And then love: both a growing and intimate chumminess, as well as a physical passion consummated wherever two teenagers can find privacy in a smallish French town in the homophobic ’80s.