Nous serons des héros par Brigitte Giraud (review)

Reviews 235 present. In order to understand that phenomenon, the narrator seeks to identify its source, all the while recognizing the chimerical nature of that quest. For memory is not always reliable—and it is often in its moments of unreliability that it is the most captivating.“Le passé recomposé du souvenir se complique des passés inventés”(351), remarks the narrator, realizing that it is in that complication that narrative interest resides. Lottie’s skills as a storyteller beggar those of the narrator, however. She knows when to disclose information and when to withhold it; she flatters, she inveigles, she commands; she rubs fiction against fact in order to make sparks fly. One may accuse her of infidelity with regard to lived event, or one may admit that “event” is itself a highly constructed notion, a notion that assumes significance only insofar as it figures in the stories we choose to tell. University of Colorado Warren Motte Giraud, Brigitte. Nous serons des héros. Paris: Stock, 2015. ISBN 978-2-234-077591 . Pp. 198. 17,50 a. Set in the early 1970s, this novel follows eight-year-old Olivio who, with his mother, flees from Portugal to escape the dictatorship of António de Oliveira Salazar, who ruled Portugal from 1932 to 1968 and founded the Estado Novo (New State), the corporatist authoritarian government that lasted until it was overthrown by a military coup known as the Revolução dos Cravos (Carnation Revolution) in 1974.Having settled in a suburb of Lyon, mother and son strive to integrate into their new surroundings and forge a positive future. Naturally, they struggle with the fallout from their physical uprooting and feelings of exile, as they must learn a different language while mother strives to find work and son must survive in school. For Olivio, who learns only after having fled Portugal that his father died in a Portuguese prison, his cat Oceano proves to be his most faithful companion, especially as he transfers onto the cat his feelings of missing his father. In the hopes of a fresh start, mother and son move in with Max, a recently divorced pied-noir who is not dealing well with the separation from his son Bruno. Olivio is right to be fearful of Max and the changes he will bring into his life. For example, since Bruno is allergic to cat hair, Max does not want Oceano in his house. Distraught, Olivio offers to keep Oceano locked in his room. But Max will hear nothing of it: “Max exigeait qu’on laisse le chat dans le jardin, on n’allait pas s’empêcher de vivre pour un animal”(70). Fearful for Oceano’s safety as the garden is not enclosed, Olivio must accept Max’s solution to have Oceano neutered to prevent “d’avoir envie de fuguer et de se bagarrer avec d’autres chats”(70).Worse yet for Olivio are the changes to his mother: “[D]epuis qu’elle avait rencontré Max, je la sentais vivante,elle s’achetait des robes,des foulards et des boucles d’oreilles,elle confectionnait les gâteaux qu’elle cuisait au four comme au Portugal, elle allait chez le coiffeur” (79– 80). As a result of Max’s rudeness and often-boastful nature, combined with the fact that he does not easily accept Olivio who has developed into a sensitive teenager, cohabitation is difficult. Luckily for Olivio, his friendship with Ahmed, an Algerian immigrant of his age, provides the much-needed comfort he covets. Giraud presents the immigrant experiences of the Portuguese and the pieds-noirs, while showing the sharp opposition between Ahmed’s and Max’s perspectives on Algerian independence. Equally heartbreaking is Olivio’s narration, at the outset of the Carnation Revolution, of the upheaval felt by the Portuguese who fled Salazar’s dictatorship; their emotions range from sadness of not partaking in an historical event to euphoria that the dictatorship has ended. Canisius College (NY) Eileen M. Angelini Grangé, Jean-Christophe. Lontano. Paris: Albin Michel, 2015. ISBN 978-2-22631816 -9. Pp. 777. 25 a. With its evocative vocabulary, darkly humorous style, and fast-moving plot, this first installment of a two...