May Our Joy Endure (ebook)

Céline Wachowski, internationally renowned architect and accidental digital-culture icon, unveils her plans for the Webuy Complex, her first megaproject in Montreal, her hometown. But instead of the triumph she anticipates in finally bringing her reputation to bear in her own city, the project is excoriated by critics, who accuse her of callously destroying the social fabric of neighborhoods, ushering in a new era of gentrification, and many even deadlier sins. When she is deposed as CEO of her firm, Céline must make sense of the charges against herself and the people in her elite circle. For the first time in danger of losing their footing, what fictions must they tell themselves to justify their privilege and maintain their position in the world that they themselves have built?

Moving fluidly between Céline’s perspective and the perspectives of her critics, and revealing both the ruthlessness of her methods and the brilliance of her aesthetic vision, May Our Joy Endure is a shrewd examination of the microcosm of the ultra-privileged and a dazzling social novel that depicts with razor-sharp acuity the terrible beauty of wealth, influence, and art.

Praise for Querelle of Roberval

“It has finally arrived: the erotic Québécois novel about labor conflict that we’ve all been waiting for . . . The book is written in an icy style. Try to find a surplus adjective—I dare you. It is not for the squeamish but (or rather, and) is easily one of the best novels I’ve read this year.”
—Molly Young, New York Times

“As this off-putting yet attractively written novel explores both meanings of the word ‘union,’ sex and domination are presented as conjoined compulsions that can lead to brutal forms of ecstasy.”
—Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal

“Structured as a reimagining of Greek tragedy, Querelle of Roberval is a book that reads like a swift, vivid dream. The language is direct and cuts straight to the bone, while dealing with passions both personal and professional . . . Brutal and beautiful by turns, this novel will grip readers from the first sentence all the way to its shocking conclusion.”
—David Vogel, Buzzfeed

“Lambert’s fearless novel is a profane, funny, bleak, touching, playful, and outrageous satire of sexual politics, labour, and capitalism . . . The book is brash, beautiful, quasi-mythic, and tragic. Most improbably, for all its daring and provocation, Querelle of Roberval is lyrically, even tenderly written.”
—Atwood Gibson Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize Judges’ Citation