I’m currently reading a novel in French, having immersed myself in the language for the past six weeks. During my school days, I studied French grammar and basic vocabulary, but I only recently got the hang of conversational French, in particular the use of past perfect (passé composé).
The novel – Moka by Tatiana de Rosnay – tells the story from the first person perspective of Justine, who receives an unexpected phone call informing her that her son has had a road accident. Although I still have lots more to read, I would imagine that Justine’s search for the truth behind the accident leads to a surprising, maybe shocking, discovery.
Admittedly, I wouldn’t normally read the English version of a novel in that genre, preferring crime thrillers or gritty teen/Young Adult, but I felt the novel would give me a chance to widen my experience of the French language.
So far, I’ve found the flow of words easy to follow. I like the immediacy, the sense that a reader can understand complete sentences in a different language, even if they don’t recognise particular words. Also, I hope to sense and experience the world from the perspective of the principal character, without language being a barrier.
As you can probably imagine, I’m pretty keen on the French language…plus, I love to read, play piano on a serious level, and write my own stuff. Fiction. Gritty. Crime.
Meanwhile, I’ve put my latest working novel (the third) aside for a bit, having just received a professional critique, but my debut Secrets (adult thriller) and second novel EggHead (teen/Young Adult), are available on Amazon. Check out the reviews.