These are three serious and poignant books that win this month. Three texts which summon mourning, renunciation, but also light, which sometimes appears where we least expect it. In the Fiction category, the Italian Gabriella Zalapì (who writes in French) irradiated the literary season with her 8-year-old heroine, both lucid and lost, become hostage to adult stories which disturb and exceed her. In a moving story, Anne-Dauphine Julliand recounts the unthinkable: the loss of three children, and the life that continues, despite everything. The thriller of the month, finally, is breathtaking, tender and delicate, and takes us into the intimacy of a couple and a man whose life is turned upside down when his beloved companion disappears in the night. Three books which express, in their own way, the hope of a future.
Also read >>> First novels: our 4 favorites for this literary season
Fiction
Little Ilaria, 8 years old, is waiting for her big sister after school, but it is her father, in the middle of a divorce, who picks her up. What was supposed to be a short journey then turns into an endless escape, two years of wandering on the roads between laughter and fears. Italy, the 1980s, the car radio blasting, the bland rooms above the bars… It looks like a family road trip, but it's more of an upsetting and bitter ride. “Ilaria” is not just the story of a divorce gone bad and the kidnapping of a child. It is also that of a child confronted with the world of adults, who must construct herself alone. Gabriella Zalapì writes a moving novel about family love and its contradictions, the end of innocence and the disobedience of a little girl in search of freedom. – Cécile Bonzanni
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“Ilaria or the conquest of disobedience”, by Gabriella Zalapì (Zoé, 175 p.).
Non-fiction
Surviving your children is not in the order of things. While Anne-Dauphine Julliand lost her two daughters to an orphan disease, her son committed suicide fifteen years later, on the eve of his 20th birthday. This book tells us about tomorrow, the after, survival – for the couple and the younger child –, our ability to give space to pain without letting ourselves be overwhelmed by it. Marvel again, focus on details to anchor yourself in life. Little things, putting on nail polish, rejoicing in the smell of bread… Leaving the darkness of mourning for the child who remains, for yourself… Anne-Dauphine Julliand will be sad all her life, but not every time. moments. And that's the main thing. “I can’t bring my children back, but I can choose how I will live it,” she wrote. – Stéphanie Passicos
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“Adding life to days”, by Anne-Dauphine Julliand (Les Arènes, 144 p.).
-Policeman
A woman disappears in the Rennes night, leaving neither explanations nor clues.
As is often the case in this type of affair, suspicion falls on the husband. But the days and months pass without Camille resurfacing. Her omnipresent ghost leaves a hole in the heart of her husband, Loïc, and those close to her. For a long time, Camille had this hole in her heart: until they used a surrogate mother, the couple was unable to have children. I found this description of the world of GPA, between expectation and hope, very interesting. We witness Loïc's descent into hell, devastated by his immense grief and the suspicions that continue to weigh on him. As for the detective mystery, the author skillfully leads us from track to track, until he instills doubt. – Claire Marache
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“A hole in the heart”, by Nicolas Zeimet (Cold Sweats/Denoël, 436 p.).
This month, our jurors also read in the Fiction category: “Mythology of the .12”, by Célestin de Meeûs (Le Sous-Sol) and “Another awaits me elsewhere”, by Christophe Bigot (La Martinière). In the Non-fiction category: “Monsters”, by Claire Dederer (Grasset). In the Thriller category: “Surfacing” by Clea Koff (Héloïse d’Ormesson).
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