A man in this novel cooks lentils and beans while listening to the cobbler couple next door brutally beat their small daughter before having passionate sex. A recurring character in this novel advises using banana grease and cotton as earplugs to avoid hearing constant drumming while in a shop infested with thousands of stinking caterpillars. In this novel, the bellicose American nurse Lola despairs at gaining two pounds from taste-testing apple fritters. The linguistically (15[1])informal narrator of this novel fights in the Ardennes in World War I, mans a trading post in (*) colonial Africa, and works an assembly line in Detroit before becoming a bitter doctor serving the Parisian poor. For 10 points, name this novel following the cynical Ferdinand Bardamu, the first novel by Louis-Ferdinand Céline. ■END■