Second Star

"If the singularity of Philippe Delerm’s work had to be summarized in one image, it would be this: the decanting of key moments in our lives. Letting the tumult of our modern existence come to rest, letting the surperfluous bits sink to the bottom, so that the writing, that prodigious alchemist, can reveal to us the truth of those moments in all its limpidity—and their beauty." —Actualitté

"Throughout this collection of lighthearted vignettes, the author invites readers to slow down and cherish moments . . . getting caught in a rain shower, eating a clementine one-handed . . . or the joy of bouncing a baby in your arms . . . Delerm’s brief observations allow readers to dip in and out, offering moments of reflection and contemplation." — Kirkus Reviews

"Delerm finds resonant meanings in everyday objects, moments, and coincidences, burrowing into surprisingly emotional depths as he probes attachment and loss . . . The point of the exercises in Second Star is to mentally invigorate, to sharpen how we look at the things in plain sight that we take for granted." — Thomas Filbin, The Arts Fuse

"Delerm’s beautiful book of brief meditations reminds us that lingering, observing, noticing, wondering—about a gesture on the soccer pitch; visitors to the public piano; oneself interacting with others on the street, on the train—is one of the ways our lives become meaningful."—Ross Gay, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and author of New York Times bestseller, The Book of Delights



"Philippe Delerm is capable of taking the smallest sensations and observations and turning them into quiet meditations that fit within a frame that is never too tight or too large." — Joseph Schrieber, Rough Ghosts


"Delerm packs big ideas into small packages . . . While Delerm is interested in slowing the reader down to savor minutiae and to question some of life’s accepted nuisances, holiness is averted. In its place are intelligent observations and terse judgments laden with wit . . . Delerm’s literary snapshots nestle well into the long history of authors penning atmospheric flash and micro essays . . . This is the perfect book to keep handy after a rough day." — Ben Woodard, On the Seawall


"Whether it’s watching a couple dance on the Seine, listening to the sounds of Venice, watching a man on the bus, or dancing without knowing how, this is a book that breathes life into the reader, one snapshot at a time." — Amy Bobeda, Full Stop

"The snapshots refuse to guise their heavy French accents; the reader sinks into the place. The 'music of conversation' persists amid the parentheses of glances, and the captions beneath the silences between laughter and looking elsewhere. Delerm invites us to the tables of his preferred setting and lays a poet’s eye over the details and affects . . . If Delerm wrote the sky, Gladding is the one who named and organized these particular, incandescent constellations." — Alina Ştefǎnescu