The ten best first novels of the new school year

Sarah Jollien-Fardel, Claire Baglin, Corentin Durand, Guillaume Lebrun, Philippe Dumont, Maria Larrea, Catherine Logean, Polina Panassenko, Luc Vezin, Anthony Passeron: ten new feathers to discover.

“His Favorite” by Sarah Jollen-Fardel

Child born in a “rustic” village of Valais, the heroine of Sarah Jollen-Fardel was never quiet. With “fear as a compass” for the first fifteen years of an existence that unfolds in daily terror. Like her mother and her older sister, she has to deal with the uncontrollable violence of a truck driver father. Learn little by little to come out of your shell, to build yourself, to discover tenderness. Impossible mission ?

Sabine Wespieser editor, 205 pages, 20 euros.

FNAC Novel Prize. First selection of Goncourt

“In the dining room” by Claire Baglin

Claire Baglin’s young narrator alternates here between two stories marked by a concern for precision and a voluntary absence of judgment. That of the daily gestures of her job in a fast food restaurant, where she is assigned to the drive and the room. And that of various moments of his childhood and adolescence with his family: his father, his mother and his brother. A great way to create incandescence behind an apparent coldness.

Editions de Minuit, 176 pages, 16 euros.

First selection of the Medici

“The inclination of Corentin Durand”

Provincial established in Paris, the hero of Corentin Durand stopped his studies. He earns his living by delivering a chemical drug to an underworld population. Before setting sail for Spain. Where, to the rhythm of New Order tracks, this “child of chance and nowhere” to use a phrase from Modiano, tries a little more every day to get rid of loneliness and emptiness. Which gives a vertiginous first attempt, between modernity and classicism.

Gallimard, 288 pages, 20 euros.

First selection of the December prize

Guillermo Fantasies by Guillaume Lebrun

Sacred verbal banter than that of this Yolande d’Aragon from “class one thousand three hundred and eighty” ! The heroine of Guillaume Lebrun confesses “severely depressed” in a Kingdom of France struggling with the “English”. Determined to lend a hand to Charles VII, here she renounces her status as a court woman to become “guerrilla”. By being able to count on the strong support of Jehanne the twelfth who sees in her the “Supreme Queen”. Stripper as possible.

Christian Bourgois editor, 315 pages, 20, 50 euros.

“Fortunes and misfortunes of the beautiful Yelena Sergeïevna Doumanovskaïa” by Philippe Dumont

The longest title of the season perfectly introduces the subject of Philippe Dumont’s hilarious novel. Where one happily accompanies Léna’s journey. An endearing heroine who manages as best she can with the Soviet system, does not lack resources and does not mind paying for it.

Le Dilettante, 224 pages, 18 euros.

“The people of Bilbao are born where they want” by Maria Larrea

Maria grew up in a Parisian theater with Spanish immigrant parents. A “borderline” father and a mother “under a chemical jacket”. The young girl feels ugly and worthless, she becomes dazed and dreams of becoming a filmmaker. One day, an appointment with a clairvoyant turns her life upside down, seriously questions her origins and leads her towards the light.

Grasset, 224 pages, 18.50 euros.

First selection of the December prize

“Confessions to a Ficus” by Catherine Logean

Geoffroy willingly admits it. His attempts to teach “somewhat unsatisfactory or reasonable” to its existence have failed. He worked in packaging for perishable items, tried his hand at experimental theatre. At his psychiatrist’s, he exposes the state of his confusion to a ficus every week. The hour of the great upheaval has finally come for the whimsical hero of Catherine Logean!

The avenging tree, 216 pages, 17 euros.

“Hold Your Tongue” by Polina Panasenko

In this autobiographical novel, the narrator has taken steps to use her birth name instead of her French name. Becoming Polina again instead of the Pauline supposed to help her integration. Born in Moscow, she arrived in France, in Saint-Etienne, in 1993 with her parents and her sister, two years after the dismantling of the Soviet Union. It’s not easy to manage to forge an identity when you’re split between two languages ​​and two countries.

Editions de L’Olivier, 186 pages, 18 euros.

First selections of the Medici and the Fémina

“The Uneventful Life of James Castle” by Luc Vezin

In a bar in Philadelphia, the narrator of Luc Vezin’s novel hears for the first time about an artist whose work will change his life to the point that he will seek to unravel its mystery. Born deaf, James Castle grew up on a remote farm in Idaho. As a kid, he spends his days drawing on everything and with everything he finds. There was nothing to suggest then that he would be recognized today as a major artist of the 20th century perfectly acclaimed here.

Arléa, 224 pages, 19 euros.

“Sleeping Children” by Anthony Passeron

The hero of “Sleeping Children” says it himself: his book is the“final attempt to keep something alive”. Under his precise pen, two stories intersect. That of the tragic fate of his uncle Désiré, a heroin addict in the hinterland of Nice. And that of the appearance of a terrible disease in the 1980s. At a time when people were starting to talk about pneumocystosis and Kaposi’s syndrome.

Globe, 273 pages, 20 euros.

First selections for the December prize and the Flore prize