From the spring, a well -informed journalist colleague assured us that Antoine Gallimard had promised Goncourt to Emmanuel Carrère for Kolkhoze (POL). Weather change in June: three publisher’s patterns assured us, with conspirators’ tunes, that Carrère will have two influential jurors of Goncourt against him (names communicated on request) and that Antoine Gallimard pushes another candidate in the person of Nathacha Appanah for Night in the heart (Gallimard, therefore). History is an eternal restart.
Sacre Carrère for all of his work more than for this new disappointing book, it would be reproducing the 2010 vintage (Michel Houellebecq for The map and the territory); Choosing Appanah for her female triptych would be returned in 2009 (Marie Ndiaye awarded for Three powerful women). Note that, according to serious sources, the Femina Prize would like to grill politeness in the Goncourt by cheeing Appanah – the femina will be awarded on November 3, one day before Goncourt …
Back to school stars
While waiting to see what will come out of these cozy intrigues, let’s read some start -up stars that could be used on the Goncourt list: Akira Mizubayashi (The forest of flames and shadowsGallimard), Franck Bouysse (Between allAlbin Michel), Antoine Wauters (High-folieGallimard), Sorj Chalandon (Kells’ bookGrasset), Maria Pourchet (StartStock), Jakuta Alikavazovic (To the big onesGallimard), Caroline Lamarche (The beautiful darkThreshold), David Diop (Where is the sky leaningJulliard), Laurent Mauvignier (The empty houseMidnight), Grégory Le Floch (Piping skinThreshold), other real talents, other false values.
Michel Bussi, who tries to redo the Olivier Norek blow last year by offering a big historical novel on the civil war in Rwanda (The shadows of the worldThe city’s presses), will he be able to seduce the ten from Drouant? For our part, failing to be Philippe Claudel (the president of the Jury Goncourt), we found the perfect winner: Adelaide of Clermont-Tonnerre for I wanted to live (Grasset). Surfing in fashion that surrounds Alexandre Dumas right now, she puts the novel of Cape and sword on page and rehabilitates the character of Milady, of which she makes a touching heroine. With Intelligence and Style, Clermont-Tonnerre succeeds in something very difficult: she will enchant specialists and will also appeal to the general public. We hope, at Christmas, to be able to offer his book surrounded by the famous red banner …
In terms of pure literature (but who still cares?), The summit of the start of the school year is Sacred lights (Grasset) by Cécile Guilbert, superb autobiographical account centered on her relationship to India, which will delight the fanatics of Cristina Campo and René Daumal. Connoisseurs will also be sensitive to the novels of Pauline Dreyfus (A bridge over the SeineGrasset) and Victor Pouchet (Trip tripGallimard): The first traces over a century the contrasting evolution of two neighboring villages, in a language crossing Colette and Paul Morand; The second confirms that he is the most poetic writer of his generation through a road trip during which a marital drama (the impossibility of having a child) is softened by the fantasy of the couple in question.
What would be a return without the chestnut tree of books on dad/mom? In addition to Emmanuel Carrère, we will see Amoulie Nothomb everywhere (So much the betterAlbin Michel), Raphaël Enthoven (AlbatrossThe observatory), Justine Lévy (A funny painStock), Vanessa Schneider (Hard skinFlammarion) and Anne Berest (FinistèreAlbin Michel). In this big battery, the most interesting seem to be the story of Catherine Millet on the suicide of her mother (Simone EmonetFlammarion) and Catherine Girard’s investigation into her father, Georges Arnaud, author of Fear salary (In violence of truthGrasset). Another theme always in vogue, love, which is found in particular in Sarah Chiche (To likeJulliard), Alice Ferney (Like in loveActes Sud), Chloé Delaume (They call it loveThreshold) or Ghislaine Dunant (An infinite loveAlbin Michel). Which of the four will best say modern love?
It is a lapalissade: writers are interested … in writers. To those who dream of going into exile in the Anglo-Norman Islands like Victor Hugo in his time, we recommend two stories: that of Salim Bachi, who focuses on the Jersey years of our national myth (The Rocher of ProscribedPlon), and that of Edouard Launet who returns to his years Guernesey (Victor à PubordArthaud). We hear a lot of good from the novel by Sylvie Le Bihan on Louis Guilloux (Friend LouisDenoël) and we are curious to read that of Julie Brafman on Yann Andréa (Yann in the nightFlammarion). In a more underground vein, the journalist Pierre Boisson makes us rediscover Christine Pawlowska, a cult figure of the 1970s, in Flame, volcano, storm (The basement).
On the side of the first novels, three titles are already emerging: Geography of oblivion (Robert Laffont) of Raphaël Sigal, Four days without my mother (Philippe Rey) of Ramses Kefi (nothing to do with Three days with my mother by François Weyergans!), And above all The good mother (The iconoclast) of Mathilda di Matteo, a gulling portrait of a cagole mother who has everything to hit the cinema). In addition to these beginners, booksellers should support the sympathetic Fabrice Caro (Last days of weightlessnessGallimard), Gaëlle Nohant (Man under the stormThe iconoclast), Gilles Marchand (Orphan promisesTo the forges of Vulcan) and Rachid Benzine (The man who read booksJulliard). In well -spotted authors, let’s not forget Anthony Passeron (JackyGrasset), Pierre Jourde (The merchant of forgettingGallimard), Nathan Devers (OverheatedAlbin Michel), Laurent Nunez (Everything will be fineShores), Léonor de Récondo (Walk in your stepsThe iconoclast), Basile Panurgias (The Novel of VassilisSéguier), Lise Charles (ParanoiaPOL), Fabrice Gaignault (A bookArléa), Joseph Incardona (The world is tiredFinitude), Anne Serre (Vertu a RosalindeMercure de France), Lionel Duroy (An irreparable evilMialet-Barrault), Fabrice Humbert (On the other side of lifeCalmann-Lévy), Alexandre Postel (All earsThe observatory) … the readers of “left” will bring to the clouds Fatima Daas (Play the gameThe olive tree) when those of “right” will praise Christian Authier (FatherThe rock). We have tried to bring together the most dissimilar writers here in the same paper.
Our persi
Despite our open-mindedness, let us allow ourselves some persiflages. As every year, the Medici Prize should therefore reward the most pretentious thought in the fall. In this game, we wish Céline Minard good luck (TovaangarShores), Camille de Toledo (In the time of my angerVerdier), Hélène FRAPPAT (NeroActes Sud), Vincent Message (Ocean madnessThe threshold) and Cloé Korman (Give birthFlammarion), who seem to have the profile to succeed Julia Deck.
A literary school year is a butcher’s shop. In a few weeks, the broken mouths will be picked up with a shovel. Who will come out alive? Who will go to the hatch? On the side of popular literature, the legal practitioner Star Philippe Boxho returns to tell us about corpses with a new collection of impeccably titled memories Death is my life (Kennes). See you at the end of August for the first reports live from the editorial morgue.
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