All About Sarah is a novel about a love affair in Paris, between a single mother with a young daughter and Sarah, a musician who lives life loudly and certainly. The unnamed protagonist seems to be drifting through her job as a teacher and looking after her daughter, but then she meets Sarah at a party, and everything changes. She finds herself happy and excited, but the intensity of their relationship and the obsession and violence that will spark from it, mean this is not an uncomplicated love affair, and she finds herself unable to think of anything but Sarah.

Translated from French and written in very short chapters, this is an easy novel to read in one or two sittings, with a sense of travelling through the relationship via the protagonist's emotions and key memories. The style of the narrative draws you into the book, but the narrative itself does feel a bit lacking, a not particularly original story of an intense relationship between two women with elements of obsession and abuse under the surface. All About Sarah is told well, but feels like a predictable story of how a woman who has never been in a same sex relationship before falls in obsessive love with another woman.

Out of all books in the world, French novels about love written in short chapters are undoubtedly my favourite. When read in one sitting, they gave you all the usual emotions of a relationship, sometimes the ones you wish you could have, many times ones that you rather just read about. The love in All About Sarah belongs to the second category.

It is an enjoyable novel about a relationship between a young school teacher and a slightly older violinist. The book describes their relationship across all its stages, from the unforgettable first meeting, snippets of details only people in love pay attention to, and the eventual end. It is a very fictional relationship, that would hardly work in real life, but is enjoyable to read about. As it would be considered problematic on many levels, it should be taken with a bit of perspective.

I had mixed emotions about the characters. Yes, they were irresponsible and extremely self-centred, but not into a point where I would be annoyed by them. Surprisingly, the thing that drove me mad many times was rather the use of the word "snatch" that I will never stop connecting with this book from now on.

Overall, the fact that I have finished this book in one sitting that rarely happens proves that I enjoyed reading it a lot. It had all the elements that a book I adore should have and I would not hesitate to read other works from this author. I would recommend this novel to all people who like reading French novels that leave them feeling like they have just got out of an unhealthy, yet unforgettable relationship. In the best sense possible.