From the best-selling author of Three Strong Women comes a thrilling novel about a triple homicide that dredges up unsettling memories from a lawyer’s childhood

Maître Susane is a single, middle-aged lawyer, living a quiet, modest existence in Bordeaux. But when Gilles Principaux shows up at her office, asking her to defend his wife who is accused of a horrific crime, Maître Susane becomes obsessed with one question: Who is this Gilles Principaux? She thinks she recognizes him from her youth, and she seems to remember having been alone with him. It was a significant event, but one her mind can’t quite reconstruct.

While this mystery preoccupies Maître Susane during the day, at home she is greeted by Sharon, her faithful but peculiar housekeeper. Sharon arrived from Mauritius with her husband and children, and she lacks legal residency in France. And while Maître Susane has generously offered Sharon her professional services, the young maid always finds ways to evade her, claiming the marriage certificate Maître Susane requires is being held hostage. Is Sharon being honest with Maître Susane, or is something more sinister going on? And why would Gilles Principaux come to her, a run-of-the-mill lawyer, for the most important trial of his life?

Told in a slow seethe which recalls the short novels of Elena Ferrante and the psychological richness of Leila Slimani’s work, Vengeance Is Mine is a dreamlike portrait of a woman afflicted by failing memories, tortured uncertainty, and an unreliability that frightens her.

MARIE NDIAYE was born in Pithiviers, France, and studied linguistics at the Sorbonne. She is the author of Rosie Carpe, winner of the Prix Femina, and Three Strong Women, winner of the Prix Goncourt. She is also the recipient of the Gold Medal in the Arts from the Kennedy Center International Committee on the Arts. She lives in Berlin.