I am reading this. It is a good story in a lively translation. I am enjoying the intellectual act of reading it. But the book as physical object is one of the sorriest and most pathetic excuses for published material I have ever paid money for. The paper is thinner and coarser than some newsprint I have seen, the binding is flimsy and may not survive a single reading. Shame on you, University of Minnesota Press. May Balzac’s ghost haunt your nights until you are driven mad with despair and drown yourself leaping from the Pont Neuf.