Ici commence un amour by Simon Johannin

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Ici commence un amour is a story about love, but it is also a story about grief and class and growing up, about trying to be a writer and a man and a person. It’s tender and restless and vicious at times. It reminded me of Sheila Heti in certain ways and of Edouard Louis in others. Like his protagonist, Théo, Johannin is from Marseille, and the book feels steeped in the city, exposing its contradictions and hypocrisies, its particular brand of politics, its staggering wealth inequality, its thriving culture, and brutish repression. 

Violence threads through the novel. For a story about a young writer navigating the foibles of the literary scene, it is startlingly raw and sharp and in tune with the world. Gloria, the love of the title, is less a muse than a woman. The story is narrated in second person at times, like a letter addressed to her, which I found jarring at first but which is woven neatly into the narrative fabric. Johannin writes in clear language, which is often colloquial, but which easily shifts registers from affectless to emotive. 

Johannin is young and immensely talented. An exciting writer to watch for the future. 

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Miriam Gordis is Director of Albertine Books, succeeding Sandrine Butteau, who held the position from 2017-2024. Miriam has worked at Albertine as a Bookseller since January 2024. Prior to joining the store, she worked in book publishing, most recently as a Literary Scout at Maria Campbell Associates where she was in charge of scouting the French market. She has served as a reader for the Whiting Award for Nonfiction and for the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. Miriam has a BA from the University of Oxford in Modern Languages and she has worked as a legal translator in Paris and as a copyeditor in Moscow. She is a lover of non-fiction, visual art, pilates, and sunshine.
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