David Le Roux is a schoolteacher living a quiet, peaceful life with his wife, Lydia. They have no children. He also paints and rents a small house to use as his studio – a space that belongs only to him. Every morning he leaves their comfortable flat and goes there to work and paint in solitude. One day, after going out to buy something, he returns to the house and finds a young Black woman there, acting as if she were his wife, and two small children who call him \u201cDaddy.\u201d From that moment on, his life becomes strange and unsettling. The situation forces him to confront painful memories from his past. The novel feels slightly dystopian but remains grounded in reality. It is tender, thoughtful, and ends on a funny note. I really enjoyed this book, which seems quite different from what I understood Andr\u00e9 Brink usually wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2018Embeth, please! We can sit down and discuss this like grown-ups.\u2019 David Le Roux is a schoolteacher living a quiet, peaceful life with his wife, Lydia. They have no children. He also paints and rents a small house to use as his studio – a space that belongs only to him. Every morning he leaves their comfortable flat and goes there to work and paint in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20300,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[291,299,293,294],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books-2026","category-challenge-abc-prenoms-2025-2026","category-challenge-riquiqui-2026","category-challenge-solidaire-2026"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/dim-gunger-jZpC9PTw9xY-unsplash-scaled.jpg?fit=1655%2C2560&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20299"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20301,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20299\/revisions\/20301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redheadwithabrain.ch\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u2018Like hell we can.\u2019 And again she mocked in that high-pitched voice, \u2018With a meid, David? David, with a meid?\u2019
\u2018She was hysterical. They were all unreasonable.\u2019
\u2018You\u2019re scared. I told you that very first day: you\u2019re scared.\u2019
\u2018Of what?\u2019
\u2018Of taking a decision. Of choosing, for once, what you want to do, not your fucking family.\u2019
\u2018Why should we be in such a hurry? We can take our time.\u2019
\u2018I can\u2019t see the point of letting this drag on and on.\u2019
\u2018Let\u2019s first see what happens.\u2019
\u2018No. You make up your mind. Like now.\u2019
\u2018It\u2019s not fair.\u2019
\u2018Then just fuck off.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"