After 19 years of repeating himself professionally, Louky Crapo finally gets the promotion he was hoping for: head of the cold meats section. No, he does not work in a butcher’s shop, do we quickly understand in We all die of having livedthe first novel by the literary columnist of Montreal Journal Karine Wilder. “In the medium of journalism, she writes, this carnivorous phrase […] rather refers to obituaries written well in advance and kept cool until the death of the celebrities concerned. Careers and lives are chopped up by the menu. All that remains is to add the when and the how.
Employed in the New York office of the Free Press Agency, Louky Crapo dreamed of signing such texts instead of vegetating in anonymity by laying obituaries on Mr. and Mrs. Everybody who nobody cares about. apart from their relatives. The miracle takes place in this year 2009. Not only does Louky get the coveted position, but he excels in this role. Better than he imagined. Because he discovers… a little talent? A donation ? Let’s just say his life is about to change.
We feel it from the first words: despite its theme, Karine Vilder’s novel is not consumed with a funeral head. The author’s pen is dipped in humorous black ink. And then if, as is believed, journalists dream (all?) of being writers, their journalistic practice does not take the edge when fiction imposes itself.
This is the case in this story, yes, preposterous, but also full of true anecdotes about the most bizarre deaths – several “rewarded” by Darwin Awards which, created in 1993, specialize in the thing. And then, picking up the narrative thread to add facts or information at the bottom of the page, Karine Vilder sows here and there the fruit of her research and/or her years of journalistic experience and/or as a reader.
On arrival, if the puns (which percolate even in the names of the characters) flirt with the “too much” and the humorous detours can sometimes weigh down the reading, We all die of having lived distracts, amuses and really does good. Do we really need it? the other would ask. Yes.