Aux frontières de la soif
Haïti, janvier 2011. Fito Belmar est architecte-urbaniste et écrivain. Après le succès de son premier livre, il vit aujourd’hui de ses rentes et mène une existence rythmée par les soirées bien arrosées avec ses amis... Mais il cache aussi un lourd secret : certaines nuits, il se faufile dans le camp de Canaan et approche de toutes jeunes filles que la misère vend au plus offrant. Gigantesque camp de réfugiés créé juste après le séisme de janvier 2010, Canaan est devenu depuis un immense bidonville regroupant quelque 80 000 personnes vivant dans la précarité, la violence et le dénuement.
Lorsqu’il accueille Tatsumi, une journaliste japonaise avec laquelle il n’a communiqué que par messagerie électronique, Fito doit jouer l’hôte parfait. Il n’est pas insensible au charme gracile de la Japonaise et un rapprochement amoureux semble possible… Tatsumi saura-t-elle ramener Fito vers une existence plus lumineuse?
- Littérature générale
- Paru le 03/01/2013
- Genres : Littérature française - Littérature étrangère
- 176 pages - 140 x 205 mm
- EAN : 9782715233652
- ISBN : 9782715233652
Foreign Rights
At the Frontiers of Thirst
Rights sold
Germany - Litradukt
Presentation
Haiti, January 2011. Following the phenomenal success of his first book Fito Belmar lives off his royalties and leads an apparently comfortable life, partying with his friends and mistresses. He could be the happiest man on earth were it not for his heavy secret. On some nights, he creeps into the refugee camp of Canaan to approach the very young girls driven to prostitution. Canaan is one of these huge refugee camps built in haste in the aftermath of the January 2010 earthquake, and that has since then become a slum where around 80 000 people survive as best they can. In this squalid labyrinth of plastic sheets, poverty breeds gangs, arms and drug dealing and prostitution. Fito tries to fight this dark side of his, but finds himself returning always towards this den of inequity. When Tatsumi, a Japanese journalist covering the events on the island comes to stay with him, Fito feels threatened. He must play the part of the perfect host. If she discovers his secret, he is lost. Fito isn’t impervious to the Japanese girl’s graceful charm… The beginning of a love story seems possible. Will Tatsumi draw Fito towards a brighter existence?
The duality of good and evil, the ambiguity of sentiments and perverted innocence are at the heart of Kettly Mars’s new novel. Her lucid description of her country highlights the failures of international aide, showing the material and moral consequences of the earthquake: a dangerous promiscuity, children sold into prostitution, a world that has lost its soul and where everything and everyone becomes an object to be bought and sold.
Kettly Mars was born in Port-au-Prince, where she lives now. She is the author of three novels, amongst which Saisons sauvages.
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