Maryline Desbiolles will present her new novel L’Agrafe published by Sabine Wespieser on Tuesday September 17 at 7:00 p.m. at the Librairie Le Square in Grenoble.
The Staple, a short, punchy and poignant novel.
A lively novel, just like its heroine Emma. Nicknamed “the athlete” because she tirelessly roams the hills of the Nice hinterland like a gazelle. Until the day she partially loses the use of one of her legs. The reason: a dog bite. Reason, he doesn’t like Arabs. It is this sentence dropped by her friend’s father that will haunt her and trigger her need to return to her family’s past.
It was with her uncle, a harki, that she discovered the suffering endured by those who were described as traitors on both sides of the Mediterranean.
Maryline Desbiolles highlights racism past and present. Present when Emma’s mother calls out to the hospital staff to tell them that her daughter is experiencing severe pain. Pain caused by a cast that is too tight, she knew it, they had disdained her. Necrotic leg.
And then all the humiliations suffered by the Algerian people both in their country of origin and in France.
But haughty Emma will display her difference, her handicap with panache. And we, readers, close this book touched in our hearts and our flesh.
