Nouveaux Romans
Gavalda Awes France, Spielberg Grabs Levy, and Sijie Pays Dues to Balzac
While most of the English-speaking world tried to figure out what to do with its heaping Star Wars inventory this month, the international lists — particularly the French — were galvanized by first-time authors who’ve put critics in a tizzy and sent bookstore tills into overdrive. Anna Gavalda’s first book, I’d Like Someone to Wait For Me Somewhere, rushed to the #6 slot on the French list, selling 56,000 copies and making this collection of “nouvelles” concerning the rigors of daily life in France La Dilettante’s biggest book to date. In fact, according to Claude Tarrène of La Dilettante’s foreign rights department, no one’s shy about getting their hands on Gavalda’s series of light, short character sketches of everyday Parisians — it’s disappearing faster than fresh baguettes, at the rate of a thousand copies a day. The 28-year-old author has been deemed “the master of the first impression,” and had critics falling all over themselves when she showed up at the very fashionable Prix de Flore (one said her book ought to win the prize for “the most beautiful love letter to France”). Her work was also named one of the twenty best books of the year in the Prix RTL-Lire, and two years ago she captured a short story prize at the National Festival of Saint-Quentin. La Dilettante has been courting offers from all over Europe (Carl Hanser took German rights), while US rights are still available from La Dilettante’s Claude Tarrène.
Meanwhile in France, Steven Spielberg bought up film rights to another French novel by a new author, And If It Were True? by Marc Levy. Described as a novel which entices the reader “into believing the unbelievable,” the novel seems tailor-made for Spielberg’s supernatural-yet-romantic métier — and strangely enough, according to publisher Laffont, Levy’s romantic comedy even “reads like a film.” The work deals with a certain Arthur, who is shocked to find a strange woman inhabiting the closet of his new San Francisco apartment. Here’s the catch: the gal’s invisible to everyone except Arthur. She happens to be the spirit of a young woman whose corporal body resides in a coma in a local hospital, and the drama entails Arthur’s increasingly fervent efforts to halt her family from pulling the plug. Levy, incidentally, is an architect who splits time between the US and Paris. The novel sold over 100,000 copies in just three weeks, and rights have been sold to 28 countries, including Pocket in the US.
Not to be outdone, China-born filmmaker Dai Sijie is creating a stir in France with his first novel, Balzac & the Little Chinese Tailoress, which tells a largely autobiographical tale of two adolescents sent for “re-education” during the Cultural Revolution in China. They are saved when they find a trunk filled with subversive French literature (Balzac, naturally). Gallimard reports that 24,000 copies sold in 4 days, with 80,000 in print in the first month, due in large part to the ever reliable Bernard Pivot and his TV program, Bouillon de Culture. Six German publishers are bidding for rights, while offers have been made in Italy, England, Sweden, Denmark, and Greece. We’re told several US publishers have requested reading copies. See Anne-Solange Noble at Gallimard for details.
Notable in Brazil this month, columnist Luis Fernando Verissimo has three irony-fueled collections of work on the charts. Brazilian Summer Stories, appearing at #8, focuses on his popular columns on middle class day-to-day life. The other volumes cover the current president’s administration and other aspects of Brazilian culture. Verissimo is author of The Angel’s Club, which held court on the Brazilian list for most of last year. Rights have been sold to Germany, UK, and Spain, but are still up for grabs in the US. See Lucia Riff at Agencia BMSR for details. Also in Brazil, the production of a miniseries on Globo Television has created a buying frenzy for the book that started it all, The Wall by Dinah Silveira de Queiroz. This 1950’s historical novel follows the drama of the 17th-century pioneers who founded Rio de Janeiro in part because of the great fortifying “wall” of mountains surrounding the region. Silveira de Queiroz, who died almost twenty years ago, was the second woman ever elected to the Brazilian Academy. The miniseries and the book have not yet been licensed abroad; see Sergio Machado at Record for rights.
A different ghost from the past makes an appearance on the Swedish list, with the comic book version of Frans G. Bengtsson’s 1942 novel Red Snake. It seems the story of Viking hero Orm Tostesson and his adventures in the tenth century have found a place in the annals of literary cartoons, following the wide appeal of the original novel, which was sold in sixteen different countries when it first appeared (its US title was The Long Ships, published by Buccaneer Books). A film adaptation was produced in the sixties starring Richard Widmark. See Rolf Classon at Galago for rights.
Taking up an epic subject of a different sort, Sweden’s Per Olov Enquist plumbs the relationship between sexuality and power in his new novel The Doctor’s Visit. The work takes place in Denmark in the 1760’s and follows the rise and fall of the royal physician Dr. Struensee, who simultaneously gained the confidence of the the mad King Christian and the heart of the young queen (no easy feat). The stealthy Struensee was said to put into practice many ideas that were not generally accepted until after the French Revolution, twenty years later. Unfortunately, the doctor did pay one last visit — to prison — where he was hung, drawn, and quartered by the rebellious Danish nobility. Since publication in September, publisher Norstedts reports a total of 55,000 copies sold in Sweden. Rights are sold in most European countries and are under negotiation in the US. See Agneta Markas at Norstedts.
Following the ritual bon-bon transactions of Valentine’s Day, amorous themes continue to be popular in Italy, where The Love Book has lulled readers with a compilation of the best love poems worldwide. Rights are still there for the plucking, says Emmanuela Canali of Mondadori. And we take note that love is also on the mind of the UK’s William Sutcliffe, whose new novel The Love Hexagon investigates the complicated emotional landscapes of six Gen Xers, who must finally put down their dog-eared Douglas Coupland novels and come to grips with that natural disaster known as romance. Penguin will publish in the US this fall.
