Olivier Norek, Renaudot prize for high school students 2024

Editions Michel Lafon, directed by Elsa Lafon, will have to find space for the cover banner of Olivier Norek's novel, Winter Warriors. Already winner of the Jean Giono Prize, the author, who also appeared in the final selections of the Goncourt, Renaudot and Interallié prizes, has just been crowned again, and this time by the Renaudot prize for high school students. He succeeds Lilia Hassaine, who was crowned last year with Panorama (Gallimard). He is also among the potential winners of the Goncourt for high school students which will be announced on November 28.

For this Renaudot of high school students, Olivier Norek, an on-call police officer, won ahead of the four other authors in the running, and not the least:
Gaël Faye for Jacaranda (Grasset), Benjamin de Laforcade, Berlin for them (Gallimard), Miguel Bonnefoy, The Jaguar's Dream (Shore), Antoine Choplin, Masao's boat (Buchet Chastel).

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Olivier Norek: “I have always used thrillers as an alibi”

Le Figaro had noticed The Winter Warriors among the essential novels of the literary season. A story “surprising and gripping”in the words of Bruno Corty in our August 28 edition. Norek was used to writing thrillers. With this new novel, he took a step aside by diving into History: ” In Winter Warriorsthe author of Code 93, In the mist of Capelinstells a little-known episode of the Second World War. The invasion of Finland by its Russian neighbor in November 1939. For Stalin, a major challenge: not letting the powerful German army arrive at the gates of the Nordic countries. In his eyes, invading Finland, this small country which has only known independence since 1917, will be child's play. The disproportion between the two armies in number of men and equipment is laughable. » But the Russian army will come across a bone: Simo Häyhä, a little guy but a hell of a sniper, defeating one of the largest armies in the world against a very small country. As was highlighted during its distinction by the Jean Giono Prize jury, the novel achieves the feat of pleasing readers – it is one of the best sellers – and the jurors of the major literary prizes.

For this 2024 edition, more than 400 high school students from 16 high schools in the academies of Poitiers, Limoges, Bordeaux, Orléans-Tours and Nantes, as well as two foreign establishments (Romania and Madagascar), read, debated and exchanged with their teachers to nominate the novelist, who will go to meet them in December, in Loudun, in Vienne, the birthplace of Théophraste Renaudot.