May 2021
THE STRANGE POWER OF DISASTERS
A topical novel about the fertile social mutations triggered by a pandemic. How a highly lethal disease will allow a mother and a son to find their way back to each other...
by Hélène Le Bris
France, summer 2029. A strange disease with an unspeakable name, called “Plague” for convenience, is sweeping the country. Deadly and highly contagious, it strikes in successive waves, upsetting the economy and social relations and overturning democracy. It eventually withdraws to Paris, placed under lockdown.On either side of the medical barricade, a mother and her grown son witness contrasting events, she in her village, repopulated by townspeople spared from the virus, and he imprisoned in a devastated Paris. Their past opposes them, their present also keeps them apart: she struggles with paperwork in the filthy workshop next to her house, and he enjoys his job as a guide for the Louvre Museum. As the plague takes its toll, an unexpected reconciliation gradually takes place.Their relationships with their loved ones also change. A couple of overworked caregivers, a distraught garage owner, and an emotional fortune teller experience with them the shock that the plague imposes on human relationships.
