A French Book Reading Resource

[Carmody]

Many thanks.

[DaveAgain]

I have just finished La nuit de feu by Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt. It is about the hiking trip in Algiers that he took as a young man during which he got lost out on the desert and underwent a "religious" experience.

Ok, so I just finished the book a second time through and know this is not a book for everyone.

In fact it deals with the author’s “La nuit de feu” or his mystic experience one night stranded and lost in the Sahara desert. Roughly put it was a mystical experience that totally took over his being and moved him deeply and beyond words.

Since I had a very similar experience early on in my life, I find it very interesting to read about. It is the only example in western literature of a person going through such a profound experience that I know of, so I found this of special interest.

Like I said this is not a book for everyone, but given my life experience I would give this book a 9/10.

Blaise Pascal also had a "nuit de feu", after which he jotted down some impressions titled Mémorial.

This was mentioned in a radio programme Portrait d’un homme joyeux ~35m into the programme.

[Carmody]

You certainly are one very closely observant listener/reader. Thanks for the guidance.

[terracotta]

Carmody, I wanted to thank you for this wonderful thread. I have recently started reading in French and your posts have been so incredibly helpful. I just finished reading La Poule et son Cumin that I came across here, and really enjoyed it! Cannot wait to go through other recommendations!

[Carmody]

Am so glad that this thread has been useful. Your mention of La Poule et son Cumin is a new one for me.

[petitesouris]

I am, grumble, still at a graded reader level — grammar-wise I do all right but my vocabulary is a gongshow — however I have very gratefully gone through and noted down many of the recommended titles in this thread for future enjoyment. So many of them sound right up my alley, especially Leon l’Africain and the Lorànt Deutsch books about the history of France. Thank you all for your thoughtful reviews over the years!

I hope by the end of the 2024/25 Super Challenge I’ll be in here making recommendations of my own, with an especial mental note to share any reasonably cheerful books I come across. Just off the top of my head, I have high hopes that Maylis de Kerangal’s Réparer les vivants will be a hopeful read despite or perhaps because of the subject matter, depending on how you look at it — it’s a novel about the delivery of a deceased person’s organs to those who need them.