I Remain in Darkness

“A testament to the persistent, haunting, and melancholy quality of memory.”

– New York Times

“As always, Ernaux's marriage of opposites—disgust and adoration, revulsion and emulation, dirt-physical and heady-theoretical—takes place on the whitest of pages. Ernaux's opposites rip her in two in spite of her spare languages. . . . [Her] art is in her fight with words.”

– Los Angeles Times

“Ernaux courageously bears witness both to complex multiple truths of family relationships and to the fierce persistence of family love.”

– Washington Post Book World

“Again blurring the line between memoir and fiction, Ernaux continues the story of her family in journal form … Several recurring themes are woven throughout, notably those of time, art and the relationship between mother and daughter. Like Ernaux's other work (Shame; Simple Passion), this is "not literature" exactly, but "an attempt to salvage part of our lives, to understand, but first to salvage," poignant though limited in its reach.”

– Publishers Weekly

“This slim volume by noted French writer Ernaux (Simple Passion) is not a straightforward medical account of her mother's death from Alzheimer's; instead, it is a collection of the notes, in their original form, that Ernaux jotted down at the time of her mother's illness. "When I write down all these things, I scribble away as fast as I can (as if I felt guilty), without choosing my words." Here in their raw, uncensored form are the "vestiges of pain" at the anger, guilt, and grief that Ernaux felt during her mother's two-year decline.”

– Library Journal