We have introduced the "Lugon Makkar Series" over the past 20 volumes, and this article will list them and give a brief summary of what each piece is about.

In "Prey's Share," the protagonist, Saccar, made a huge amount of money mainly through land speculation, but in this film, we see him throw himself into a new battle by establishing a huge bank. Saccard's rival Jews are modeled on that Rothschild family. During the Second Empire of France, financial wars actually broke out between the new banks and the Rothschilds. Zola painstakingly researched these facts and incorporated them into this work.

I must confess that this piece was the most bewildering to read of the 20 volumes of the "Lugon-McCall Series."

The storyline was so eccentric that Angelique's dreaming was not unlike Zola's, and the prince actually appeared and fell in love with her, and even asked her to elope with him.

For me, for better or worse, this work had a strange impact.

The Land" depicts the lives of French peasants in the countryside. And as we can see from the works we have seen so far, France was undergoing rapid economic development and people's lifestyles were changing, as depicted in "Bonheur des Dames Department Store".

This novel was painful to read. I can't tell you how many times I sighed at the sheer rawness and misery and lack of redemption...

Zola must have wanted to express the problems faced by farming villages that much more sincerely and straightforwardly. I think it is more than worthy of being called a masterpiece.

This story is also Zola's autobiographical novel. The relationship between the protagonist, the painter Claude, and his close friend, the novelist Sandoz, is reminiscent of the relationship between the impressionist painter Cézanne and Zola.

Cézanne is the master of Impressionism. Zola and Cézanne had been schoolmates since Zola was 15 years old, and they remained in close contact with each other even after moving to Paris. Zola wrote many art criticisms for the development of Impressionism, and Zola himself learned a lot from the genius of Cézanne. In a sense, the two were allies in opening up the art world.

It is a great book to know the birth pains of an artist!