Mauriac looks at the conflict between Sexual Desire and the Soul as it plays out in the physically and morally battered France of the aftermath of the Great War. Gisèle is a nice young girl of good family, convent-educated and with an older friend, Lucile, who is of impeccable character and acts as a sort of spiritual director to her. What could possibly go wrong? Well, shocking as it must have been to Mauriac's readers at the time, it turns out that Gisèle actually rather likes the occasional sexual adventure. Fortunately, there's nothing as devious as the Catholic Church when it comes to rescuing souls in peril, and threads are twitched just in time to save her from perdition.

There were some quite enjoyable passages, but there's a limit to how much jazz-age Catholic moralising most of us are prepared to put up with these days, and this book, short as it is, goes way beyond that limit. Recommended for those who wish there was more Bossuet in F Scott Fitzgerald. ( )