Week 6: Weekly Challenge

J'ai découvert un écrivain Québequois cette année. Steve Laflamme qui a écrit Barbe bleue. Une livre de la collection des contes interdits. Ce n'est pas dans mes habitudes de lires des livres d'horreur, mais j'ai bien aimé sa façon d'écrire, ses descriptions et ses intrigues.

Last Days of an Immortal by Fabien Vehlmann. It's a science fiction graphic novel about a man whose job is to help alien cultures understand each other. Read it in high school, found it again a decade later and it held up. This book changed my life a little bit.

Technically on my TBR, this is a translated YA fantasy series. It has a forced marriage, political ploys and travel through mirrors. It is incredibly popular and often recommended.

I see that someone else also read this series, but it was really enjoyable so I needed to post about it too! I really enjoyed the world building and characters. It has touches of Philip Pullman but is still very unique. It's a bit of a commitment as it's quite long, but I think worth it. I listened to it as an audiobook (which I borrowed from the library) and it was hard to get it completed in the allotted borrow time, so I recommend giving yourself lots of listening time and/or renew if you go this route!  

I read this book in French to practice reading and learn new vocabulary.  It was so interesting and imaginative.  I bought many Quebecois novels when I went to Quebec city last year, and next on my list to read is Vingt mille lieues sous les mers (Twenty thousand leagues under the sea). I also read this romance book called Swipe a droit, but thought it was just so/so. 

I'm not sure if Mordecai Richler counts, but I really loved the book The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz.  I read it a long time ago for grade twelve English haha.

I read L'Étranger/The Stranger by Albert Camus in high school, and I remember it was my first contact with absurdism and existentialism. It was part of the reason I became interested in philosophy. It's very well known, so this isn't a hidden gem but I really enjoyed it at the time and I'd like to revisit it again! 

So fun that you're doing this challenge, right when I'm exploring literature in the french language! Bonheur d'Occassion is a classic. I hadn't read it since high school and just read again. Took longer than it would have in English but the language was so poetic and the story so gripping, I'm glad I did.

The library has been very helpful in suggesting other books, which I'm looking forward to, and in the meantime have taken the french translation of The Way the Crow Flies off the shelf to read. 

Victor Hugo wrote a great work called Les Misérables. It remains a smart choice for learning and reading.

I love mystery books so I found this novel about Enola Holmes in French. It is by Nancy Springer and I believe it is part of a series of books. This book is highly recommended for anyone that finds reading in French hard to follow. This book was so easy to read and even though my French isn’t the best this book was my favourite.

I was first introduced to The Little Prince (Le Petit Prince) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry as part of my high school French class many years ago. Years later, I got a copy of my own and re-read it in English (as my French has since rusted away, alas). It's a short book with a rather eccentric character (the prince) but it is full of insightful commentary on common human behaviours, such as obsessed with money or keeping routines/traditions without question. The following passage is one of my favourites, enjoy!

"I know a planet where there is a certain red-faced gentleman. He has never smelled a flower. He has never looked at a star. He has never loved any one. He has never done anything in his life but add up figures. And all day he says over and over, just like you: 'I am busy with matters of consequence!' And that makes him swell up with pride. But he is not a man - he is a mushroom!”

I clearly need to add more variety to my reading list. That is one thing I love about the SRC, it exposes me to books and ideas that I wouldn't have been exposed to otherwise. I am now motivated to add more translated works to my reading list. 

I think the only novel that I've read that has been translated from French is Jules Verne's , Around The World in Eighty Days. 

It has been a number of years since I read that novel but I do recall loving the adventure in the story. 

Je me souviens avoir beaucoup aimé les romans d'Arlette Cousture (Les filles de Caleb, Blanche) ainsi que la série de télévision de ces livres.

Avec mes enfants, on aime beaucoup les livres  absurdes d'Elise Gravel.

I hope this counts as a book but I love this serires. Definitely best to read it in French because the humour is impecable 

The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo was originally or also written in French. It has to be one of my favourite childhood books, and I wish my french was better so I could reread the book in French. I did some research and originally the book was published in French in 1831 as Notre-Dame de Paris.