French Book Club Events wrap-up – The Postcard: lively discussion & unusually personal stories shared

A wrap-up from Jacqueline Dubois Pasquier and Judy MacMahon
We had two live Zoom discussion EVENTS on Saturday 27 April to discuss ‘The Postcard ‘by Anne Berest, translated by Tina Kover. Book club members and event participants were in seven time zones: located in France, Wales, England, Australia, Canada, and across the USA.

After Judy’s introduction and brief survey:

How do you rate the book from 1 to 5 ? We had answers from 3,5 to 5++ in the first event and 4 to 5 in the second event. Probably an overall rating of 4/5 Book club members very much enjoyed this book.

Jacqueline shared some general remarks on the whole story :

First of all, I don’t think that The Postcard as historical fiction genre, can be compared to such works as Hillary Mantel’s ‘Wolf Hall’ for instance on many levels: literary/language/style/ depth/structure/study. It’s not Booker Prize material, if I dare say.

And yet, it’s the kind of book you can hardly put down once started, that makes you reflect on the whole world as well as your own life, that is heart-wrenching at times, enlightening on French post ww2 cultural scene at others, and is not only historical but a whodunnit too, a kind of search for lost time !”

Jacqueline also mentioned members Donna, and Ray’s recent participation in the Facebook bookclub group, whose remarks are at the core of this book— an auto-fiction (as labeled by Sarah)

Yes—I enjoyed this book. Good pick! And I look forward to the discussion. I’ve been delving into my ancestry, and I found this passage rang a bell with me.”

I don’t know. I feel like some sense of memory makes us attracted to places our ancestors knew, celebrate dates that were important in the past, and become drawn to people whose family once crossed paths with ours without our even knowing it. Call it psychogenealogy, or cellular memory . . . all I know is, this isn’t just chance. I was born on September 15; I studied at the Lycée Fénelon and then the Sorbonne; I live on the rue Joseph-Bara just like Uncle Emmanuel did. The similarities are pretty shocking, Maman.”

Emma and Ephraïm ‘s tragic destiny made members reflect on their own family stories and share them. It is uncommon for people to speak about personal matters in a group and less so online. The fact that this happened made the discussion all the more special and heart-warming. Several members exchanged contact details to meet up in real life. These Book Club Events are just the right size to allow lively, in-depth, and meaningful conversation and are not too big for participants to feel comfortable sharing.

We all shared our thoughts and comments about the book.

• There was much discussion around the structure, in the light of book 1, mainly as we found the other parts rather disappointing, although…
• some said that the different styles of parts two and three served different purposes. Part one was telling the family story compared to Parts 2 and 3 which were research, fact-finding, and discovery.
• One of the participants said she would have preferred to have these parts differently organised, to which many agreed.
• While others said that they appreciated the back-and-forth style and the part structure as it was like life: messy.

At the end of the discussion, Jacqueline concluded that she was glad to have come across this novel, an exception in the French literary contemporary landscape, it’s longer than the usual contemporary French 180 self-absorbed pages, it’s historical, not sociological, and it is multi-layered.

Overwhelmingly attending book club members applauded Jacqueline for this choice and some readers stated that they would not have read the book otherwise. They were very pleased to have read it.

MyFrenchLife Book Club Events April 2024

Judy announced we would resume the book club activity in September and would soon provide a list of books as (northern hemisphere) ‘Summer reads. We will provide a list of books, mostly recently translated French fiction. Readers will be free to choose from that list, and then at the end of the reading period. At the discussion event, those present will talk about their book.  Members said they are looking forward to reading in French or English. Some may even read more than one book.

At the end of the year, we will return to our normal format of having just one pick—one book we read. together