It’s winter. Little Gabriel plants a few stones gleaned from his father’s orchard in the garden of the family home. In the spring, the shrub becomes the confidant of the boy, who has swapped his little down jacket for a teddy. The teenager plants the plum tree in the ground. Page 6: Gabriel, having grown up, tells his friend, who has become a bird sanctuary, about his love for a young woman he has just met. And inscribed their initials in the bark as if to seal this union. In the taste of Mirabelle plums, by Delphine Pessin and Delphine Renon, life passes at full speed and each big step is a delight.
Gabriel and Adèle get married under the flowery canopy of the Mirabellier. Fruit abounds and so do babies, who will soon be playing on the swing installed on a solid branch. The little blond heads climb into the perched hut, with sticky hands stuffing themselves with Mirabelle plums. Autumn is coming, the leaves are turning yellow and the big children are leaving the house. Gabriel and Adèle, their hair bleached, open their garden wide for family celebrations and then put on their winter coats. A “For Sale” sign, life is behind them. Remains the mirabelle plum.
The taste of Mirabelle plums, intended for 3-6 year olds, tackles the subject of human life, and its end, with a joyful grace. The story of this little Gabriel – the most given first name in recent years in France – is not as common as it seems. The narrator, very poetic, is in fact the plum tree. Over the course of the book, it turns out that the tree takes the leading role, crossing the pages and the generations. It changes the focus of conventional children’s stories – where children are the main characters.
In this album, the cycle of life – certainly a very conventional life, the only criticism one can make of the book – then seems tangible. The time of nature is different, slower, watching us grow, love, give birth and die, while accepting that we leave our mark there – a heart engraved in a piece of bark.
After multiple readings before bedtime, we could guess in the very soft drawing a turtle. It nestles in each double page, in each stage of the life of Gabriel and his Mirabelle plums. With this serenity and discretion that characterize the pillars of nature. To wonder if it is not she, after all, the real main character.