Wilfried N’Sondé

Sœurs d’hier

October 2, 2024
Novel
88 pages
140 × 180 mm
10 €
9782366249415
978-2-3662-4941-5

“Récits d’objets” collection

Flora, a woman from Flores, Salia, a Neanderthal woman and Kai, a Sapiens woman, had no reason to meet. But when a natural disaster brings them together in the same part of the world, their paths cross for a time. In contact with each other, despite their limited means of communication and the absence of a shared verbal language, they learn about mutual aid, benevolence, a form of care and sisterhood that is still little-known. At the same time, they will have to face up to dangers which, from aurochs to water shortages, from toxic gas to aggressive hunters, will make this alliance more necessary than ever.

Although this postulate is scientifically implausible, it is at least the story that Wilfried N’Sondé wanted to imagine after seeing the wax statues of these three “prehistoric women” side by side at the musée des Confluences in Lyon. In just a few pages, he presents us with a veritable fresco of our origins, reminding us that the hominids we are today are nothing more than the product of the successive evolution of different species, each passing on to the next what was most precious to them. In so doing, he also questions notions of performance, evolution and diversity, inviting us to cherish differences and welcome otherness, always a source of enrichment. It also reminds us of the power of fiction to support the imagination where scientific evidence is sometimes limited.

The author

Né en 1968 à Brazzaville, Wilfried N’Sondé a grandi en Île-de-France et vécu vingt-cinq ans à Berlin. Il habite désormais à Lyon. Il est l’auteur de sept romans publiés chez Actes Sud, notamment Le Cœur des enfants léopards (2007, prix des Cinq Continents de la francophonie et prix Senghor de la création littéraire), Un océan, deux mers, trois continents (2018), qui a reçu une dizaine de prix littéraires, parmi lesquels le prix Ahmadou Kourouma, le prix France Bleu / Page des libraires et le prix des lecteurs de L’Express / BFMTV et Femme du ciel et des tempêtes (2021). La Reine aux yeux de lune est paru en 2023 chez Robert Laffont. Dans ses récits, Wilfried N’Sondé propose de grandes aventures historiques à travers lesquelles il interroge l’expérience de l’exil, de l’altérité, ainsi que notre rapport au monde vivant.

Strong points

After Simonetta Greggio, Bérengère Cournut and Pierric Bailly, among others, Wilfried N’Sondé enters the “Récits d’objets” collection, co-published with the musée des Confluences.

In this short tale of historical fresco and adventure, we follow the postulated meeting of three prehistoric women who are about to learn about sisterhood.

A hymn to otherness and a quest for origins, this short text also reminds us of the power of fiction when scientific facts are lacking.

October 2, 2024
Novel
88 pages
140 × 180 mm
10 €
9782366249415
978-2-3662-4941-5

“Récits d’objets” collection