A richly detailed book about Breton lives, culture and folklore looking back to 1908 to 1939. Not exactly a memoir nor anthropology, Helias's autobiographical stories of peasant life have qualities of both. Most distinctively, the book evokes ways of life among the peasants of Brittany long since disappeared in rich, earthy detail. With black-and-white photographs. Claude Chabrol made a film of the book (a bestseller in France), his 32nd.  (FRN344, $26.00)