It may be hard to like the Mazal family, but it is surprisingly easy to love them. Perhaps that is because this quirky, pretentious family is presented through the eyes of 11-year-old Isidore, the youngest of six children and the least over-achieving of the bunch. His three oldest siblings are on track to have completed advanced degrees by the age of 24. Jeremie performs with a symphony, and Simone, who is closest in age to Isidore, has skipped several grades and is working on her first novel. When "the father," as they call him, dies unexpectedly, the Mazal children--and their mother--seem to take his death in stride. Until the ever-observant Isidore begins to notice the small ways grief has changed the family.
How to Behave in a Crowd, Camille Bordas's first book written in English, is a darkly comedic coming-of-age story. In Isidore, Bordas has crafted a young, naïve, observant and unexpectedly wise character, whose sudden insights into the workings of the world are made all the more striking for his general bewilderment over much of what he observes in the adults around him. As he navigates the tender emotions of his family's grief--and his own--How to Behave in a Crowd moves beyond Isidore's typical 11-year-old angst and into the territory of adult confusion. Do people just pretend to be okay? Maybe, Isidore's experience seems to suggest. But maybe that's enough. --Kerry McHugh, blogger at Entomology of a Bookworm