The Book of Proper Names
Amélie Nothomb
 In a vaguely surreal story, an extraordinary little girl is born from strange circumstances - her mother murdered her father, gave birth in prison, and then hanged herself. Plectrude, as the girl is unfortunately named by her mother, is adopted by her aunt and lives a fairy-like existence until she enrolled into the Paris Opera Ballet School, a rigorous institution portrayed as a "scalpel to slice away the last flesh of childhood." fr:Robert des noms propres nl:Robert des noms propres