Heading to faraway India and a mythical city for “Pondicherry or the shore of shadows” (Ed. Buchet-Chastel, 592 p.), a dazzling first novel by the writer and journalist Anne Vantal. At different times, three women are forced to leave France for Pondicherry, where their lives are turned upside down. Alice, in 1930, a talented pianist, joins her husband, a doctor in charge of running the leper colony. Oriane, in 1950, returns to the places of a childhood of which she retains only vague memories. Céline, finally, in 2012, flees a dramatic family situation to work as a midwife in a maternity hospital. Skillful narration, lively and instructive descriptions: go for it!
Women’s destinies also in the gripping “On the wild side” of the American Tiffany McDaniel (Éd. Gallmeister, 716 p.). Arc and Daffy are twins, redheads and inseparable. To escape from a sordid daily life, they create a powerful imaginary world. But little by little, the river that crosses their town of Chillicothe, Ohio, drowns the women of the community, who are found beaten and disfigured. This new elegiac masterpiece from the author of “Betty” is an ode to all those who have disappeared or lost a loved one, transcended by a virtuoso and luminous pen.
Let’s stay in America, heading to Tennessee and the 1930s. “When the river roars” (Ed. Belfond, 720 p.) tells the story of Matthew Dunbar’s fight to keep his land against the Tennessee Valley Authority, which is going to flood the valley to build a dam. Alas, his daughter Arlis falls in love with Crawford, the young man sent by the authorities. A classic of American literature written in 1957 by Borden Deal, a poignant family saga as well as vibrant social advocacy, to be discovered as a literary treasure unjustly forgotten.
Let’s cross the Atlantic to find ourselves in Moscow, in 1914. In “Red and White” sign Harold Cobert (Ed. Les Escales, 528 p.), everything opposes the brothers Alexei and Ivan Naryshkin. Alexei advocates the modernization and democratization of Russia. Ivan, tormented and exalted, espouses anarchist and Marxist thoughts. But they love the same woman, Natalia, their foster sister, daughter of their governess. When, in 1917, the revolution broke out, everyone chose their side, at the risk of one day having to confront the other… Harold Cobert, a specialist in Mirabeau and Maupassant, achieved a tour de force full of sound and fury on the Russia of the 1910s until the fall of a certain Berlin Wall.
Let’s return to 1914, to England this time, to meet two other young men, Henry and Sidney, who had just left their boarding school. Henry, 18, enlists in the army to get away from Sidney, whom he desires with a taboo feeling. Sidney rushes to join him. Signed Alice Winn, a beginner but already multi-awarded English novelist, “The Ardents” (Ed. Les Escales, 512 p.) Vigorously contrasts the impulse for life that their forbidden love breathes into the two young men with the murderous madness of the First World War. An ambitious, humanist and virtuoso novel.
World War and Europe still, but in the Germany of 1946. “The Lost Book of an Edelweiss Pirate” (HarperCollins, 500 p.), new novel by the popular Brianna Labuskes, tells the story of Emmy Clarke, a librarian sent to Germany to help the Monuments Men catalog literature looted by the Nazis. Discovering a book of Rilke’s poetry dedicated “to Annelise, my brave pirate of the Edelweiss,” she sets out to discover the story behind the note. A beautiful story of love, courage, and forgiveness, coupled with an ode to the power of books to transmit.
Another miracle at the heart of the Second World War, this time in Italy. “Where love abides” (Ed. Charleston, 606 p.), 4e novel by English actress and writer Sarah Winman, is already being adapted into a series by the producers of “Downton Abbey”. In 1944, near Florence, Ulysses, a young English soldier, met Evelyn Skinner, a famous art historian who traveled the country to save works from the rubble. In the ruined wine cellar of a sumptuous villa, a friendship is born that will deeply mark the young man. When the war is over, Ulysses returns to London and returns to his previous life. Destiny will call him again to Tuscany. A warm hymn to beauty and loving families.
Let’s stay in Italy to hear the story “The Splendor of the Crespi” by Alessandra Selmi (Ed. Albin Michel, 544 p.), flamboyant saga of a family that has marked the history of the country. In 1877, in Lombardy, Cristoforo Crespi, a simple son of a dyer but new owner of a plot of land on the banks of the Adda, has a spinning mill built there. With a utopia in mind: to build a unique industrial city that meets all the needs of his workers and their families. But how can a utopia last between revolts, wars and fascism? The workers’ city of Crespi d’Adda, which inspired this novel, is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Another exciting dive into a family of utopian entrepreneurs, the very beautiful “Cézembre” by Hélène Gestern (Ed. Grasset, 560 p.)which traces the story of Octave de Kérambrun. Dreaming of taming the sea, he designs revolutionary motorboats and founds an illustrious shipping company in Saint-Malo. But when his great-grandson discovers his diaries, a completely different story emerges, mysteriously linked to that of Cézembre, a microscopic island facing the city. A tale haunted by the sea spray and magnificent landscapes of Brittany!
Final delicacy with “The Circle of Rebel Women” by Alison Goodman (Ed. Albin Michel, 528 p.). Riding the wave of the craze for intrigues revisiting Jane Austen’s England, Alison Goodman, an Australian historian specializing in the Regency, offers a playful and joyfully feminist gem. Or how, when you are 42 and have no husband, to claim your freedom in a society run by men. You will love the sisters Julia and Augusta Colebrook, detectives and improvised adventurers, juggling between unfaithful lovers and aristocrats sequestered by their husbands. Bon voyage!
