A great lesson in courage and hope

The Book Club de We cult/“Where the stars fall”. After the formidable success of “Its smell after the rain”. Moreover, Cédric Sapin-Defour returns us with “Where the stars fall”poignant account of the paragliding accident that occurred at his partner in August 2022. Meanwhile, Despite the test and the uncertain year that followed, he celebrates life and love. In addition, A great lesson in courage and hope.

“Where the stars fall” : Throughout this intimate. Therefore, poignant journey, life is celebrated, the love that is shared, the force that is transmitted

“Thanks to the ordeal and its abrasions, you get to know yourself and it is not the most harmless meetings. Similarly, »» When Cédric Sapin-Defour sees his first novel. However, Its smell after the rainclimbing sales, few people know that he has a painful experience. Meanwhile, He does not cry the loss of his dog Ubac. Consequently, but fights to help his partner overcome the accident that occurred by a bright summer day on August 12, 2022. Nevertheless,

Passionate about paragliding. Similarly, Cédric and Mathilde have set off from a top of the High Adige in the sky in the province of Bolzano. Nevertheless, But suddenly Mathilde disappears and Cédric only sees the canvas of the paraglider below. Meanwhile, She does not respond to radio or laptop. Furthermore, Then begins a very long wait. Similarly, The emergency services were warned. Moreover, the great lesson courage hope helicopter heads for the accident scene while Cédric, who landed in an emergency below, tries to regimpate towards his partner. Meanwhile,

He does not know it yet. Therefore, but the minutes of uncertainty that follow mark the beginning of a year of struggle and reconstruction. However, Because the only safe information is that Mathilde is alive, that it is too early to decide further. “At noon five and dust, you were born. You shouted loud and unreservedly, aged a second, it delights the big ones. »»

Because it is another life that begins for the couple, documented with heartbreaking sincerity. Presented in the form of a diary in a chronological disorder. alternating between the day of the accident and the days following an entire year, the story establishes a narrative tension which captivates the reader. “We think we are entering a story by its beginning. We are wrong. Our great lesson courage hope stories pick us by their environment. A large part was played without us, almost everything is in place, we were told but we saw nothing coming. »»

The prose is both poetic and brutal, like the emotional elevator that the couple took without wanting to. We spend small moments of grace which even enlighten the darkest days with always unanswered questions. to the melancholy of shared memories which will no longer return to tenderness that reveal the shared eyes at each small victory.

Because throughout this intimate and poignant journey, life is celebrated, the love that is shared, the force that is transmitted. But what affects above all in this lesson of courage. hope is the distortion of time when every moment of pain is also a moment of life that flows, inevitably.

Where it is a question of weeks and months to try to put one foot in great lesson courage hope front of the other. An expectation that can be transformed into anger, impatience, even renunciation. But that Mathilde and Cédric fight tirelessly, each in their own way. Mathilde with her strength of character, Cédric with her pen.

“I am not sure that the open wounds are the best of the incons but I only have that. One day. perhaps, you will want to know what happened on Friday then on Saturday then Sunday, and a home aid, it is a noble task. One day, maybe we will ask ourselves if we really experienced this, if we faced this thing. And there will only be the words to help us. Because to write is to fight against erasure and it is to offer to forget. Because to write. meticulously, is to make sure that nothing and no one one day comes to corrupt what great lesson courage hope you have experienced. Because to write is to flee the real and enclose it entirely. Because writing, in case of moving life, is not the least sure of anchors. Additionally, Because to write, at this precise moment, under its airs of torture, is my only remedy. I do not have any other substance to gain momentum to our world which since this morning is only. getting started. »»

He fills notebooks to say what Mathilde has forgotten. “Here have played the most intense minutes of our life. I will remember each of them, you of nothing. My mind will be marked forever and you your body, we will make a complete being. »»

Yes, despite the trials, life continues to offer moments of grace and beauty. You must then know how to enter them. because after the shock and intensive care, a new step awaits the couple. “You have done great lesson courage hope the hardest, remains the longest. »»

Henri-Charles Dhalem

• « Where the stars fall » Cédric Sapin-Defour. Stock editions. Roman, 400 p., € 22.50. Published on 08/13/2025

• Find this article as well as all the literary chronicles of Henri-Charles Dahlem on the site Books

Great lesson courage hope

About the author

Cédric Sapin-Defour lives in the mountains and travels it. He is the author. among other things, Its smell great lesson courage hope after the rainwhich was the literary event of the year 2023, translated in many countries, adapted in comics, the theater and in the course of adaptation to the cinema. (Source: Stock editions)