GG Durand

Isabelle Durand ages cheese in the volcanic caves of the Auvergne, an affineur who knows by nose and fingertip when a wheel is ready and refuses, on principle, to be argued with about it. She took the caves over from her uncle and supplies restaurants that print her name on the menu. Backgammon happens above ground, at the village café. She reads a position the way she reads a ripening wheel, by sense and long practice and never by chart, and she is quietly better at it than her level suggests. What she has is timing: she knows when, in cheese and in a match, and she will hold a position for far longer than anybody expects before she does anything with it. She is the only regular at the café who cannot be drawn into an argument about the correct play. She has an opinion, she does not defend it, and she has not been wrong often enough for anybody to keep pushing.