Novels from here: one last good turn

DAY

There is nothing better than talking about death in a lively text, with a narrator as sparkling as she is complaining!  

Eve Leroy would have liked to be a child like the others, but alas her father, a born joker, did everything to complicate her life.

From daycare, she spread everywhere the paternal version of the story of Red Riding Hood (the grandmother and the little girl ate the wolf there), convinced that this was the original story. She will learn it quickly: it is impossible to distinguish the true from the false when Papa Jacques tells.

Eve is now 50 years old, but her father is still raging. Gone to Florida, he told her one day. It doesn't look like him, but the photos show it. Until the call of a funeral parlor and a notary who announce to him that Jacques Leroy is dead and that he has made up a whole story to spare his adored daughter the misery of his end.

< p>Said daughter really does not find it funny, especially since the father's legacy is not lacking in originality. She must thus find highlighted sentences in 12 books to read, at the rate of one per month, before she can listen to the final video which is intended for her and which the notary has in her custody.

< p>He also asks her to take care of her half-brother, an uncle she hasn't seen for years. This Émile now lives in Quebec City, in a residence for people with loss of autonomy, not far from her home. 

A woman of habit, a single mistress of her time, an accountant who likes her uneventful life, Eve has no desire for the new role assigned to her. But she has a heart and her uncle is waiting for her.

A wonderful character

Françoise Cliche thus leads us into a gently delirious story, where multiply the opportunities to smile. The writer has already written children's novels, so she knows how to handle the lightness of tone without undermining the relevance of the subject.

And if his Jacques was already quite a number, Ève is too, with her delight in dictations and Christmas love films. But pests annoy her and she doesn't hesitate to show it. Ève Leroy is a wonderful character.

The author also accurately captures the mixture of sadness and joy of life in a residence for the elderly. You can cry while playing bingo or have fun baking cookies. And walking on a walker forces everyone to slow down. Even the efficient Ève Leroy must accept it.

The narrator's entourage contributes to the liveliness of the novel: her father's friends, her work colleagues, Jacques' accomplice notary, the staff of the residence… All are judiciously camped. 

And then, the very construction of the story is delightful. Because a love story will slip in little by little, too good to be true and yet… What a nice last nod in a novel that is full of them, to our great pleasure!