L’impossible retour
Prix du Premier roman du Chambon-sur-Lignon 2024 - en sélection
Au moment où son père disparaît, la narratrice constate que, hormis les grandes lignes, elle ignore presque tout de l’histoire de ses parents. Convoquant ses souvenirs d’enfance, interrogeant les témoins de l’époque encore présents, elle va arpenter sa mémoire comme les rues du XIe arrondissement de Paris, où elle a vécu, pour découvrir leur vérité, peut-être leurs secrets…
En explorant ce passé familial, Nathalie Hadj part à la recherche de sa propre histoire, de sa double culture, et tisse avec émotion le fil d’un récit des origines. L’impossible retour est son premier roman.
- Bleue
- Paru le 04/01/2024
- Genre : Littérature française
- 208 pages - 140 x 205 mm
- EAN : 9782715262522
- ISBN : 9782715262522
Foreign Rights
The Impossible Return
All rights available
Awards
Short-listed for Prix du Premier roman du Chambon-sur-Lignon 2024
Presentation
Born in Kabylia, Karim left Algeria as a teenager in 1956 for France where he “became” Paul. Ana, for her part, fled Malaga and Franco’s Spain in 1962 to work as a cleaner in Paris. When Ana and Karim met themselves, they recognized each other as the exiles they were: they get married and started a family. Ana becomes a caretaker, and they live in the guardhouse. Karim works in a tailor’s workshop before becoming a bank clerk. They have two children, the narrator her brother… A modest and peaceful family.
When her parents disappear, the narrator realises that, apart from the broad outlines of their story, she knows almost nothing about them. Summoning her childhood memories and questioning witnesses from the period, she sets out to explore her memory and the streets of Paris where she used to live, to discover their truth and perhaps their secrets… In this way, she will be able to understand the silences in which she has been shrouded all her life.
Nathalie Hadj is Honorary Consul for France in Malaga. L’impossible retour is her first novel.
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