I'm starting a bit late but I still wanted to put a little recap of some of my readings at the beginning of the year.
I mostly read short novels.
"Le témoin", The Witness by Joy Sorman is a remarkable book that denounces the judicial machine in France. I know that in order to write a book that is true to reality, the author went once a week for a year to attend trials. I really liked it and so I went to get her previous novel in a bookstore.
Elodie Fabiane had a period of unemployment, and as she joined an association helping the homeless, in this fictionalized story, "In the city" she recounts the daily life of these marauders. The author has been able to distance himself from her associative missions and show all the shortcomings of the organization and the help they provide. The story is never miserabilist and brings a new point of view on the city.
I read "les derniers indiens", The Last Indians, during a train ride, because my aunt is very fond of this French author, who is from the same region as her. And when I finished the novel when I arrived, I was too shocked by the plot twist, I reread it twice ; at the same time, as I never guess what the plot will reveal, You've probably guessed before I... I think she writes well about the rurality of our countryside, but I don't know if I'll read more of her novels.
I had a rather special story with Leon Bloy's 19th century novel, "The Poor Woman". I liked the story of this holy but miserable woman and wanted to know what was going to happen to her. And at the same time this novel weighed on me, I dragged on and I couldn't finish it. First of all, it's not easy, I don't know how many new words I discovered in this novel, and at the same time I had a hard time getting along with all the mystical flights of fancy in the story. Maybe, for me, the author lacked a bit of humor. In short, I recommend it to read of course, but you have to hang in there.