“Almond Heart”. By Yasmina Khadra. Mialet-Barrault. 315 pages. 21 euros.
I have modest happiness
recognizes Nestor, says Ness. This optimism saves him from depression as the bad news comes flooding in. Due to bankruptcy, he has just lost his job with the shoemaker who employed him and his revered grandmother, a former French teacher who raised him with a taste for novels, has, in old age, lost his head. who beats the charm. To add insult to injury, Ness, abandoned by his mother, sees this stranger appear from nothing with uncharitable intentions. However, despite her nickname of Almond Heart, Ness, who is not all sweetness, organizes her resistance.
+ The book of the day. The Caledonian western by Alice Zeniter
On the popular slope of the Butte Montmartre between Antwerp and Barbès, a galaxy of characters go out of their way to help the dwarf with precious friendships and firmly held dreams. The power of literature will do the rest when Ness decides to write the novel of his life.
Obviously Yasmina Khadra took pleasure in this side step. Outside the register of the violence of history and the tragedies that haunt his work, the gravity of the novelist dissolves in this tale anchored to a cheeky Paris, where friendship and solidarity are not an empty word.
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