How long does it take to read The Book of Proper Names?
The Book of Proper Names by Amélie Nothomb takes about 2 hours 34 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 2 hours 34 minutes
An evening's read
First published 2002. 140 pages, about 38,500 words. Written for young adults.
6 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 4 hours 17 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 2 hours 34 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 1 hour 36 minutes |
The page count is the median across 15 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
"To have an extraordinary life, Lucette believes, one must have and extraordinary name. Horrified by the pedestrian names her husband chooses for their unborn child (Tanguy if it's a boy, Joelle if it's a girl), Lucette does the only honorable thing to save her baby from such an unexceptional destiny - she kills her spouse. While in prison, Lucette gives birth to a daughter to whom she bequeaths the portentous name of an obscure saint, Plectrude, before hanging herself." "From her beginnings, Plectrude seems fated for a life like no other. Raised by an indulgent and adoring aunt, she is a dreamy child who is discovered to have enormous gifts as a dancer. Accepted at Paris's most prestigious ballet school, Plectrude devotes herself to artistic perfection, giving dance her heart and soul - and ultimately her body. As her world shatters as easily as her bones, she learns to survive in the only way she knows how - by committing an act of deadly self-preservation her mother would have understood best."--BOOK JACKET.
Subjects: Ballerinas, Teenage girls, Women murderers, Names, Children, Fiction
