What I was reading that month. Mostly French lit, some global voices, a film or two.
Part of the 2008 literary season. Nasser left Mali with his mother, Mama. First Senegal, then the boat to France—land of dreams, supposedly. The journey was hell. It became the kind of story you carry with you forever, the kind that shapes everything that comes after. Hebbadj tells it without sentimentality, which makes it hit harder.
10: when you still get excited about birthday candles and haven't figured out that presents rarely contain what you actually want. 20: the most exciting one—parties with friends, plans for the future, perfect skin. 30: complications start. 40: you've seen some things. Each decade is a reckoning. I've been thinking about what gets left behind at each milestone.
The title makes you think prison. It's not—though maybe it is. Cantet takes us inside a French middle school for one full academic year. We watch students and a teacher navigate that pressure cooker. It won at Cannes. It deserved to. This is what cinema can do when it stops trying to entertain and just observes.
Didn't finish my current novel, so I played that literary game Jules started and Kathel and Loula picked up. Built a story from book spines on my shelf. Came out a bit sad for an already-gloomy autumn day. Your turn if you want it.
Three stories with no obvious connection. They converge around one enigmatic figure. A young sex worker meets four men—each encounter is a kind of verbal duel. Malte weaves these threads together with precision. The result is unsettling and brilliant, the kind of book that stays under your skin.
19th century Japan. Young Yuko dedicates his life to poetry and haiku. His obsession: snow. "Clear snow / Bridge of silence / And of solitude." Fermine's prose is delicate, almost too delicate. It reads like a fable. Some will find it precious, but I appreciated the restraint.
Another 2008 season entry. Let's be clear: this has nothing to do with actual Mozambique, unless you count it as a stand-in for the traveler's imagination. What we get instead is a weird, wandering journey through memory and place. Pluyette doesn't play it straight, which is exactly the point.
From the 2008 lineup. Every morning, old Ismael climbs a ladder to pick oranges and spy on his beautiful nude neighbor. His wife Otilia mocks him for it. Then violence erupts—the kind Colombia knows too well. Armies move through their town. Everything changes. Rosero writes with controlled fury.
Shame the French publisher ditched the original title—Disquiet captures it perfectly. That unease hits you from the first page. A country road. Something's wrong. Leigh writes short and heavy. This one doesn't let go. Australian fiction at its bleakest.
Back to the Paris Opera. Started the 2008-2009 season with 100% Russian: Tchaikovsky's score, Pushkin's libretto, the Bolshoi troupe performing Eugene Onegin. The production was lush, emotional, exactly what you want from this opera. Russian melancholy delivered with full force.