Book
Venom
First published 1990
Saigon, 1946. Michel grows up abandoned amid poverty and political violence, learning to survive through adaptability and calculated retaliation. Each humiliation becomes part of a private account he intends to settle when he has acquired the education and influence to move between colonial and local worlds.
Valentine, the daughter of a diplomat, appears protected by privilege but carries secrets tied to Michel's past. Their attraction develops into a psychological contest stretching from Saigon to India, where the distinction between justice and revenge disappears as Michel turns intimacy into another means of control.
Christopher Nicole
49 books
H. Rider Haggard
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Elizabeth Chadwick
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Richard Woodman
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Neal Stephenson
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