“Born in Montreal to Egyptian parents, Éric Chacour shared his life between France and Quebec. A graduate in applied economics and international relations, he now works in the financial sector. what i know about you is his first novel. ” Break. By consulting this biographical note again, once covered the first chapters of the said work, a question resounds: did not the printer have mixed some brushes?
Ok for Egyptian parents; are disseminated, according to the story, authentic samples of this complex and fascinating culture. Having once lived several months in Alexandria, it would have been difficult to fool me. However, these lines have rightly brought back a number of forgotten flavors, those ofOum Ali and dusty neighborhoods. We also validate for France and Quebec, part of the story taking place in the heart of a Montreal with a familiar face.
But where we tick, first, it is on the mentions of economy and finance. Because the only numbers you’ll find in this book are the pagination numbers, the remaining white being draped in a particularly luminous layer of humanity and sensibility.
Throughout this drama rooted in Cairo in the 1980s, we observe the inevitable fate of Tarek, a doctor driven into exile, leaving taboos and family tensions as the only relic. The excommunicated does not tell his story there; from painfully collected fragments, someone else takes care of it for him – by means of a bold second-person narration, the same kind that gave his sentient force to A sleeping man by Perec. At the center of the chessboard, a revealing encounter will shake up convictions, distort the fluidity of the course of things, sweeping away certain pieces of the game.
Velvety like a karkadé
Back to our biographical sketch. “First Novel”. We stumble, bis. Because, however, a mastery of the language is revealed, which some authors only reach after a long way of the cross, steeped in a velvety, suggestive, skilful and touching phrasing. There is no doubt that this story has been polished, sanded, refined, refinished many times before sparkling like this. And even if the plot runs out of steam a little at the end of the course, it remains supported by this narrative framework of excellent quality. In short, if Éric Chacour manipulates finance as well as he waves the pen, I entrust him with the management of my assets with my eyes closed.
what i know about you
Eric Chacour
Alto
296 pages