Simon Liberati's Baroque Novel 'L'hyper Justine' Reviewed

Vincent Roy's review in art press (November 2009) examines Simon Liberati's novel 'L'hyper Justine,' published by Flammarion. Liberati is praised as a baroque novelist whose works, like 'Anthologie des apparitions' and 'Nada exist,' are not mere film scripts but distinct literary universes. The novel presents a neo-Justinian nocturne involving a con artist, Paris by night, an orange Rolls-Royce, and a young Englishwoman named Justine linked to a film project co-directed by Sofia Coppola and Thérèse Legros, a contemporary artist and marquise of fetishistic virtues. The cruel con artist discovers the screenplay, inspired by Sade, tells his mother's story. Thérèse Legros and Pierre al-Hamdi, the con artist who "is never a better liar than when he recognizes the hand of fate," clash during a soirée. Roy highlights Liberati's skill in coloring characters who "have forgotten their role in a play that displeases them and of which they ignore even the slightest twist."