3 must-read books

The month of January often rhymes with the start of the literary year, a moment awaited by literature lovers. In 2025, this season promises to be even richer, with great returns from authors and unexpected discoveries. Among this mosaic of works, here are three favorite novels, each offering a unique literary experience.

1 A magnificent loserby Florence Seyvos

With A magnificent loserFlorence Seyvos is interested in the complexity of family relationships through the portrait of Jacques, an enigmatic and tumultuous father-in-law. Authoritarian, dreamer, generous but toxic, this character with multiple contradictions turns the life of the narrator, Anna, and her family upside down. Between France and the Ivory Coast, this novel revisits the 1980s, a setting where memories, music and human relationships take on a particular resonance.

Seyvos, who has already left his mark on French literature with works like The unbreakable boyhere offers a story that promises to combine finesse and emotional depth. His pen, often described as delicate and precise, suggests a novel which promises to be melancholy and captivating, capable of highlighting the fragilities of childhood and the complexity of parental figures.

2 Tokyo skyby Émilie Desvaux

Émilie Desvaux offers a dive into a little-known Japan, through the intersecting destinies of the residents of Gaijin House, a bohemian guesthouse for foreigners. Camille, a young wife on the run, Flavio, a solitary intellectual, and Lenin, a character who constantly reinvents himself, compose a microcosm where quests for identity collide with the desire to belong. In Tokyo skythe Japanese capital is revealed in a new light, far from clichés, becoming a subtle mirror of the doubts and aspirations of the characters.

This novel, carried by writing described by some critics as “magnetic”promises to explore identity, uprooting and the complexity of human relationships. After his previous works – such as To the attention of the housekeeperfinalist for several literary prizes -, Émilie Desvaux seems to confirm with this work her ability to probe with finesse the inner faults and universal tensions, offering a sensitive and nuanced perspective on the fragility of human bonds.

3 The land of standing herbsby Jean Villemin

In this dreamlike and fascinating fable, Jean Villemin transports us to Nova Radom, a ghost town invaded by toxic reeds. The narrator, sent by a mysterious Directory for an enigmatic scientific project, gets lost in an absurd daily life, punctuated by evenings at the Maison Commune where people drink a strange alcohol, Gûl.

Jean Villemin, sculptor and children's author, signs his first novel here, described by Telerama as a hybrid work evoking Buzzati, Tarkovsky and Schuiten. The land of standing herbs disconcerted by its poetic and disturbing atmosphere, but seduced by its limpid and captivating writing. This parable on human hubris and the strangeness of the contemporary world promises to be an extraordinary literary experience, to be savored like a waking dream.