A young woman crosses the Channel to spend a few days with her best friend, Frédéric, who is studying filmmaking in Manchester. The young woman has just lost her great-aunt Stevenson, a colorfully eccentric character whose free spirit was equaled only by her disdain for convention and her love of literature. The only thing the elderly woman leaves her great-niece is a mysterious last phrase, which has become the title of the novel and the guiding light in the younger woman’s quest. At age 25, our narrator doesn’t want to have anything to do with: a steady relationship (soppy), her family (oppressive), novels (boring), sex (vulgar), entertainment (forced). But thanks to some chance encounters (a young woman who changes faces, a tour guide to gay Manchester, a post-punk Barbie in a nightclub) and reminders of the unforgettable Stevenson, plus the touch of grace of a loving emotion, she agrees to open herself up to the spontaneity of the world, the fragility of desire and the fertile chaos of existence. Readers will be captivated by this touching young heroine’s search for identity, as she is torn between sensuality and intellectualism. The book’s fast-paced, playful style perfectly portrays both the irritating smugness of youth and its confounding freshness.

A comically disillusioned bildungsroman about a young woman looking for her inner face, who winds up finding the key to being present in life.