From the first lines of this terrible story, the reader is plunged into the middle of war. A total war like many we know, except that we will never really know when and where the action takes place. All we know is that the attack comes from the south, that the attacking armies destroy everything in their path and that they advance towards the north, even transforming the captured children into soldiers. Obviously, the information we hear every day can lead us to believe in some sort of live report from anywhere, but no: we are immersed in the middle of fiction. “Dystopian”, as the novelist Anna-Raymonde Gazaille herself specifies from the outset.
Here she tells us about the resilience of a little girl, Tessa, whose entire family was massacred and who was placed in a refugee camp where she survived for a few years before it was in turn attacked. . She will find herself forcibly integrated into the army of the Followers of the Almighty, these invaders who have sworn to eliminate all unbelievers from the world. Enslaved, devoid of any existence of her own and any hint of humanity, her life boils down to her role: recovering ammunition from the wounded and dead on the battlefield in the midst of bursting shells. Her miserable life is transformed when she “participates” in the attack on a major border town.
The violence of the fighting gave him the opportunity to escape and take refuge in a large building in the middle of the city; it is defended by a commando of female warriors from the North, an elite legion formed exclusively of women fighting against enslavement. Tessa’s life suddenly takes a decisive turn. Those who follow Gazaille’s work will make the link here with the final scene of “Guerrière”, the short story that she published in 2015 in the collective work Crime at the library. She described the horror experienced by populations displaced by the war, the tragedy of child soldiers and the ignominy which settles in the regions under the control of terrorist militias. This new novel is a bit of a culmination.
Tessa’s journey with these warrior women is heartbreakingly intense. The novelist’s lively and chiseled writing gives the plot the depth of an in-depth documentary based on a key character. Immersed in repeated traumatic experiences, Tessa builds herself before us thanks to her resilience based on an absolute presence in the world and the people she meets.
The definition of “dystopia” — as opposed to utopia — implies “a pessimistic fictional story set in a terrifying society”… but it’s probably better to stick to the dictionary rather than attempt to make connections with the one or other of the conflicts that are tearing the world apart. One way or another, “real” or not, the story we are offered here is fortunately more inspiring than terrifying.
To watch on video