Rating: 
Summary: Living In The Phantom Zone.
Review: In Sep'75 Jean Claude Romand had skipped his final 2nd year medical school exam, an action that would have enormous repercussions for his future. Unable to face the shame and ridicule that would surely follow, Romand covered his non-appearance by openly pretending to have passed. This cover-up was to be his first false step along an 18 year road of deception which would end in murder and tragedy. Thereafter, Romand compounded his original faux pas, inventing an identity for himself founded on one lie piled on top of another. Outwardly, he presented himself to family and friends as a model family man who occupied a prestigious position as a physician with WHO. All this was complete fabrication: he never graduated from medical school, was never registered as a physician, nor was he ever heard tell of by anyone at WHO. In reality, Romand lived a deeply disturbing double life for 18 years; a fabricated, phantom existence unsuspected by family and friends. Inevitably, a day of reckoning closed in on Romand, threatening to unravel the elaborate deception. Emmanuel Carrere takes a detached view of the life of Jean Claude Romand, seeking to identify events that shed some light on what he tragically became (without ever really getting inside his head and explaining why he turned out the way he did) in this incredible, bizarre case where truth really is stranger than fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: What an empty life!
Review: Jean-Claude Romand seems to have a well-organized life: he is a successful doctor at the World Health Organization in Geneva with a beautiful house, loving wife, two nice kids and a lover on the side. That is, until he kills his wife and children on a Saturday afternoon in January 2003, murders his parents and their dogs and attempts to kill his lover before he half-heartedly tries to commit suicide (and remove any remaining traces of the crimes). Then it becomes clear that his life was one big lie: he is not a successful doctor but a medicine student that did not finish his education and who for the past 18 years pretended to be successful, but spent his days reading in the car or hiking in the mountains while everybody thinks he is working. He "earns" a living by pretending to make profitable long-term financial deals for family and friends with Swiss banks, while he is in reality using up this money for his daily expenses. And then the moment comes when people start to realize that there is something fishy going on. All in all it is a miracle that this took 18 years...
Emmanuel Carrère reconstructed this real (!) story based on court reports, interviews, meetings and even correspondence with the murderer. This is an intriguing and terrifying glimpse into the soul (if present) of a psychopath.
Rating: 
Summary: well written but shallow and misguided
Review: Jean-Claude Romand was obviously a psychopath, although he's never referred to as such in this book. And the most interesting thing about him is that he managed to get away with deceiving so many people for so many years.The author makes the mistake of trying to synmpathetically understand Romand. It does not take a rocket scientist to know that psychopaths are not like other people and that it does no good to sympathize with them. One fairly glaring error in this account is that, although Romand is shown to be a completely unscrupulous liar and deciever, the author takes him at his word that Romand spent his time when he as alone, during normal working hours, in a fairly neutral and inoffensive way. The auther even tries to imagine how sad and lonely and desolate Romand must have felt. When, in reality, chances are that Romand got up to all kind of mischief during normal working hours. And I certainly wouldn't eliminate murder as one of his past times during this huge gap in his story. This book would have been much more interesting if the author had done his homework on psychopaths and then tried to create a mental picture, or model, of how Romand's mind worked. Psychopaths may have a significantly different emotional make up than normal people, but that doesn't mean that they have no emotions at all, no innner life. So, to me this book is a great opportunity lost. One insight that the author made was useful. The fact that psychopaths are so good at manipulating people that they can get away with bald faced lies by telling them clumsily, so as to turn the clumsy lie into a pathetic "cry for help" that most people are naturally too soft hearted to resist. Really astounding stuff. It was also fascinating to learn the ease with which Romand was able to play the seemingly modest, self effacing role of a genius of medical science. He would tell everyone he was, effectively, a genius, but then modestly change the subject. The people around him wanted to believe they were talking to a genius, so they didn't press him for further info. Obviously a real genius would want to be fairly modest about it, and just live a quiet, reserved life. Amazing, totally amazing. Another thing that's missing from this story is any real digging into Romand's early life and background. There were probably many early signs that Romand was a psychopath, but I suspect this book was inadequately researched. Another problem with researching Romand's early life is that I believe he was an only child and he killed his parents before he came to public attention, thus eliminating the best source of early info on him. However, noone can argue that the author is a very accomplished and talented writer. His prose was very smooth and flowing, a real joy to read. And the choice of the title, "The Adversary", was very good, because that is essentially how psychopaths interact with people, they treat normal people's emotions as a game, a cold, calculated game. And clearely there can be no greater social evil than that.
Rating:
Summary: So much deception........
Review: This is the true story of a man in France who deceives everyone in his life about everything that concerns him, his education, profession, beliefs, and his feelings. The reality of this man is only uncovered afte he murders his wife and two chldren as well as his parents in a cold, detached series of events. The story is well written and the explanations of why the author felt compelled to write this story are quite good. The story goes from difficult to believe to unbelievable.. and yet you know that it did happen. You question how someone could deceive so many people for such a long time and why!! What was the motivation to do this, to blatantly lie and fabricate tales that had no basis in reality? All the effort that went into maintaining this deceipt could have been used to make a real living and create a real life. Instead Jean-Claude Romand lived off the money of others and avoided normal responsibilities, as well as the "normal" joys of life, and wrapped himself up in his own blanket of false stories, lies and deception, distancing himself from real emotions and those who believed they loved him. That so many people would be deceived by Romand for such an extended period of time and never doubt the outrageous stories he showered on them was amazing to read. This was a great story of a horrible person. Emmanuel Carrere is one of France's most critically acclaimed authors, and Linda Coverdale's translation does not miss a beat. Linda Coverdale is a winner of the French-American Foundation Translation Prize.
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