Gévaudan, in the heart of Lozère, is an isolated country with unending winters, a land battered by winds, haunted by wolves, superstition and fear of the devil.
Now, the devil takes the form of a terrifying monster. An unknown and bloodthirsty beast, who attacks women and children while ignoring livestock. A beast that is everywhere and nowhere all at once, who kills and then disappears.
Tracked by the soldiers and wolf-hunters of Louis XV, it remains invulnerable. Is it a man in animal form, or an animal with human intelligence?
In Versailles, anger mounts, and the king sends Antoine de Beauterne, the greatest wolf-hunter in the country. But the beast plays with the hunters as if they are the ones being hunted.
Does it obey a master or simply the forces of darkness?
Year of publication of the current edition : 2014 (154 pages)
Éditor : Albin Michel
Editor’s note: At the edge of myth and history, Catherine Hermary-Vieille revisits the legend of the Beast of Gévaudan while exploring our own secret role in violence in bestiality. A fascinating novel which probes the darkest human impulses.
The author : Since winning the Femina prize in 1981, for « Le grand Vizier de la nuit », Catherine Hermary-Vieille, born in 1943, has written novels and biographies with equal success. Among the best known are « La marquise des ombres », « L’infidèle » (Grand Prix RTL), « Un amour fou » (Prize of the Maisons de la Presse), « La Bourbonnaise », and more recently, « Les années Trianon », « Merveilleuses » and « Le siècle de Dieu ».
