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Sleeping Children

Sleeping Children

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THIS BOOK IS CURRENTLY AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER ONLY. PLEASE PLACE PREORDERS AS SEPARATE ORDERS FROM ITEMS YOU WOULD LIKE FULFILLED IMMEDIATELY. ITEMS ORDERED WITH PREORDER BOOKS WILL BE HELD UNTIL THE PREORDER IS AVAILABLE FOR FULFILLMENT. 

AVAILABLE APRIL 28, 2026

By: Anthony Passeron, translated by Frank Wynne

A captivating first novel of a family in southern France whose lives are intertwined with the history of the AIDS virus, called by Annie Ernaux “so powerful, so moving, that it lingers long after reading.”

It’s 1981. As a wave of mysterious infec­tions sweeps across the United States, a doctor in Paris encounters something unexpected: a case of a disease long thought to have been eradicated. It matches what is happening across the Atlantic—and thus begins a race to make sense of a deadly virus, one that will define a generation.

Miles away in rural France, Anthony Passeron’s family is dealing with a crisis of their own. Their small village is gripped by another epidemic: heroin addiction. Anthony’s uncle Désiré, once the pride of the family, has become one of the “sleeping children.” Often found unconscious on street corners, he is now a stranger to his family. As Désiré’s life descends into chaos, the thunder of the AIDS crisis grows closer. These two sto­ries—one intimate, one global—are about to collide.

Anthony Passeron’s moving novel is also an eye-opening story about shame and the slow poisoning that secrets can inflict on a fam­ily. Exploring the stories of the heroic few who fought not only for a cure but for jus­tice for an abandoned community, Sleeping Children is a radical vision of a history reshaped, retold, and remembered.
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