SOURCE: Hoft-March, Eilene. Review of Les nuits de Strasbourg, by Assia Djebar. French Review 73, no. 6 (May 2000): 1257-58.

In the following review, Hoft-March finds shortcomings in the disjointed and unresolved narrative threads of Les nuits de Strasbourg.

Les nuits de Strasbourg distances itself from the author's usual Algerian haunts, planting itself and a North African character or two squarely in a cosmopolitan European setting. Exile is one of the themes, although cultural isolation is not: as Djebar reminds us, Strasbourg has historically been a site of culture wars and cultural hybridism. To this interesting Franco-German mix, the novelist adds Algerian and Jewish elements and a contemporary plot.

The novel opens with a moving and often lyrically phrased description of the evacuation of Strasbourg just after France's declaration of war on Germany in 1939. This backdrop will reappear as the personal memory of François, lover of the main character Thelja...