Thomas Pesquet makes a sensational entrance – L’Express

2023-10-28 09:30:00

Everything is happening very quickly: two weeks ago, we were talking about the incessant movements in the prize list of essays, a week ago we were talking to you about the sudden entries of the novelist Didier Van Cauwelaert (L’Insolence des miracles, Plon) and the French journalist -Israeli Charles Enderlin (Israel. The agony of a democracy) and the “tumble” of “our” politicians Nicolas Sarkozy, Edouard Philippe and Alain Juppé. And now, as soon as their works are published, Thomas Pesquet and Frédéric Lenoir arrive. They are not about to give up their place as their capital of sympathy and notoriety is high. Thomas Pesquet, therefore, the favorite astronaut and second favorite personality of the French, takes the first step of the podium with My life without gravity (Flammarion). In this autobiography, Pesquet tells, says the publisher, how he went from his native Normandy to the shooting ranges of Baikonur and Cape Canaveral… Enough to make many teenagers dream.

As for Frédéric Lenoir, the star sociologist and philosopher since the 2000s, he wishes to reassure readers by reminding in The Odyssey of the Sacred (Albin Michel) that man is the only animal who seeks to give meaning to his life . Something to satisfy the worried. He too wants to give meaning to his life: the banker Matthieu Pigasse, who explains how capitalism is a system “at the end of its rope”, traces a new economic and financial path in The Light of Chaos (L’Observatoire), and integrates 16th place on the list.

And now, a quick look at the fiction side. Where we observe, like every week, the emergence of new voices from romance and fantastic literature, in this case, the Americans Ana Huang (Twisted Love. Tome I, Hugo Roman) and Holly Black (L’ Betrayed heir, Rageot). Although he lives in New York, the 4th applicant of the week (ahead of Jo Nesbo) is indeed French. You recognized it, of course, it is Marc Levy, who published The Symphony of Monsters (Robert Laffont/Versilio). This novel, which is inspired by the kidnapping of Ukrainian children by Russian troops to take them to re-education centers, has already caused a lot of noise, particularly, one imagines, in Moscow. This is why the author announced that he wanted to distribute it free of charge on the Internet in Russian. An initiative all the more laudable as the novelist is very popular in Russia.