Gemma Bovery

First edition. Tall 4to. Pp. [vi], 106. Publisher's blue cloth, lettered in gilt to spine; mauve endpapers.

A graphic novel. Nominated for the 2001 Prix de la critique of the French Association of comic critics and journalists, which Simmonds subsequently won in 2009 with her follow-up Tamara Drewe. A tragi-comic narrative of the life and death of an English expatriate lass in Normandy, drawing intentional parallels to Gustave Flaubert's bored, adulterous heroine Madame Bovary. First published in cartoon strip form in The Guardian newspaper. Adapted to the big screen by director Anne Fontaine in 2014, the film starred Gemma Arterton, Jason Flemyng, Mel Raido, and Fabrice Luchini. "A work of genius." –Sunday Telegraph