Mon Assassin - Daniel Pennac

 

The book that I didn't know I needed. Seriously. The last novel by Pennac had left me so unmoved and disappointed, but this short book (not quite a novella, not fully an autobiography) brought me peace and closure. 

It is extremely tactful, and I ultimately see it as an attempt by Pennac to exorcise some of his demons, talk about loss, give his real-life friends and unorthodox family members their chance to take centre stage, and in general come to terms with the end of his career and, in the not so distant future, eventually the end of his own life. 

Unfortunately, I'm rather certain that in a couple of years he'll be persuaded to write something else, or someone will unearth an early draft of an unfinished novel and decide to publish it, or something equally unappealing. And sadly Pennac will have his own Baugmartner or, possibly worse, Silverview or,  possibly worse, Go Set a Watchman. 

Capolinea Malaussène - Daniel Pennac

I spent months waiting for this book. Not an "edge of your seat" sort of wait, just a "I reserved it, but it'll take months before my library actually lends it to me" kind of wait. 

And it wasn't worth it. I thought that its predecessor (and in essence, the first instalment of this two-part novel) was arguably the best Pennac book I had ever read: wacky, but in touch with contemporary issues and trends, an interesting portrayal of the criminal underworld and a rather realistic generational conflict. 

This book still tries to have all of that, but with much diminished wackiness it just doesn't deliver. And if one removes so many of the comic aspects of Pennac, at that point all is left is a crime novel that really cannot match in any way, shape or form the best in the genre. 

Also: can a single contemporary writer close the circle of a multi-book story successfully? Pennac, Veronesi, Ali Smith, Coe (just the first four who come to mind)? Only Margaret Atwood has been able to write a sequel that left me completely satisfied based on recent memory. 

Il Caso Malaussène – Daniel Pennac

Well, it’s a French book but I’m using the Italian title (that’s the language I read it in, and there is no English translation yet as far as I know). My mother found this on the book exchange shelves of Turin airport, which are very well designed and very rarely used (then again, on them we found this, The Body of Jonah Boyd, and some other interesting books over time).

I honestly thought I had outgrown Pennac, and that the magic of the Fairy Gunmother and The Scapegoat could not be sustained (hence why I haven’t read a number of its following books), but this one deserves quite a lot of credit. Malaussene’s life in the 21^st century still makes sense (well, as much sense as the life of a former professional scapegoat might make!) because Pennac’s prose still works.

Crucially, the book tackles a number of issues that relate closely to my experience with students and millennials, and Malaussene's thoughts on gap years and summers spent “saving” small developing countries before coming back to our protected European homes echo mine to a remarkable degree.

The Fairy Gunmother – Daniel Pennac

I normally don’t like comic novels, or absurd ones. This one is a little different. This one is French.

I think writers can live off of one great idea, in Pennac’s case his great idea is inventing a profession – the professional scapegoat – that is so clearly essential in today’s society that I am actually quite surprised it hasn’t become popular in the real world.

The Fairy Gunmother is about Paris, its multi-ethnic identity (identities?), its ageing autochthon population, and the absurdity of every-day life. The deaths are funny, although, probably, they shouldn’t be. The police investigations are inconclusive, or lead to the wrong conclusion, as they should be.

Not quite a masterpiece, this book remains an excellent read for a lazy afternoon at home.