A jilted husband made it clear he thought his wife was Les Miserables by hiding a bomb inside a copy of the book to give to her - but accidentally blew-up his mother-in-law instead.
Romanian Florin Dan Munteanu, 38, allegedly hollowed out the copy of the famous book and packed it with broken glass, gunpowder and a battery for a detonator, as revenge for her leaving him to live with her mother.
But police told how his wife's mother unwrapped the package by mistake at her home in Petrosan, Romania, and triggered the bomb when she opened the book's cover.
Munteanu's mother-in-law, 52, survived the blast and is now recovering in hospital with serious blast injuries but she may lose her eye-sight.
He reportedly hatched the plot after a drunken session with a friend who told him that you could make a bomb by following the instructions on the internet.
The pair then downloaded the plans and put the bomb together by cutting the middle out of a hardback copy of the book and sending it to the woman marked 'private and personal'.
A police spokesman said: 'The mother-in-law was worried that it might be something threatening written from her former son-in-law - and wanted to spare her daughter the distress - but she never thought that it might be a bomb.
'The book was wrapped with a lace - when she pulled it a spring flicked it open and it exploded.'
His mother-in-law received serious injuries to her face in the blast and is currently in an intensive care ward. Doctors believe she will survive but are waiting to see if her eyesight can be saved.
Police have arrested Munteanu from Teleorman county, in Furculesti, as well his friend Alin Florin Balcescu, 39, from Plosca, also in Teleorman.
Les Miserables - meaning The Miserable Ones - is an 1862 French novel by author Victor Hugo and is widely considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.
The novel focuses on the struggles of ex-convict Jean Valjean and his experience of redemption as well as other French characters over a 17-year period.
The book has been adapted for the screen numerous times but it is best known for the theatre production of the same name.
