Virginie Despentes, superstar of the literary season

(Paris) Virginie Despentes, whose new novel comes out on Wednesday, is the undisputed star of a literary season where the race for the Goncourt and other prizes seems very open.

These are 490 novels that tumble in bookstores between mid-August and October, according to Weekly Books. The level “the lowest for more than 20 years”, specifies the specialized magazine.

The literary re-entry, a tradition as French as the crossover Julyists-Augustians in the Rhône Valley, may be criticized, but it remains the almost obligatory passage to win the Goncourt, the Renaudot or the Femina.

Dear asshole (Grasset) by Virginie Despentes, a punk literary figure and former member of the Goncourt jury, is the title that is most talked about, five years after the third volume of Vernon Subutex.

This epistolary novel on addiction, feminism, the #metoo movement, social networks, against a background of confinement, is carried by a very favorable review.

On addiction, “I do not defend any thesis”, says to Telerama the author of King Kong Theory whom the media describe as more peaceful, at 53 years old. But on feminism, she remains inflexible, as explained by her main character, Rebecca Latté.

Musso shifts

The other headliners are called Amélie Nothomb, loyal to the literary season, with The sisters book (Albin Michel), or the journalist Monica Sabolo. The clandestine life (Gallimard), which mixes autobiography and investigation of the far-left armed group Direct Action, is seen as a serious candidate for the prizes.

Frank Bouysse (The populated manAlbin Michel), Alain Mabanckou (The elongated tradeSeuil), Christophe Ono-dit-Biot (To find refugeGallimard) or Miguel Bonnefoy (The inventorRivages), confirmed novelists, benefit from ambitious launches from their publisher.

Among young authors, Émilienne Malfatto, Goncourt of the first novel 2021, (The colonel does not sleepEditions du Sous-Sol), Lucie Rico (GPSPOL editions), David Lopez (LivelihoodSeuil), Guillaume Perilhou (They will kill your sons The Observatory) or Blandine Rinkel (Towards violenceFayard) could cause surprise.

The undisputed number one in book sales, Guillaume Musso, is republishing a formula that worked for him last year: let the wave of August publications pass, and move to the end of September (Angelic, Calmann-Levy). Same strategy for rising star Mélissa Da Costa, whose Lining (Albin Michel) will be the second publication of 2022.

Among the foreign novels, we note the return of the Irish Sally Rooney (Where are you, wonderful world?L’Olivier), the successful author of Normal People or the squeaky one Cleopatra and Frankenstein by the American-British Coco Mellors (with Anne Carrière).

Paper cost

Within Editis and its fifty or so publishing houses (Nathan, Robert Laffont, Plon, etc.), the context is special. The parent company, Vivendi, is preparing to sell this group.

The literary season is an opportunity for booksellers to attract customers they have found too rare since the beginning of the year. Fears for purchasing power, the war in Ukraine and political news leaving little room for culture weighed.

According to GfK, the 2021 return had weighed 50 million euros, for more than 2.5 million copies sold. According to this institute, a reference for book sales, “the 2022 trend is difficult to predict, given the price increases to come”.

Publishing, after years of near-stability in prices, is indeed forced to pass on the increase in costs (of paper, logistics) and global inflation.

But only one success, sometimes very unexpected like that of the Goncourt 2020 prize, The anomaly by Hervé Le Tellier, whose circulation has now exceeded one million copies, may be enough to ensure a good end to the year for booksellers.

Dozens of authors can dream of such a fate. It is still necessary to convince the literary juries, launched in debates under the seal of secrecy before publishing their first selections in September.