Books
Le Carnet d'Angèle
by Lydie Haenlin
translated as Angèle's Notebook by the author, 2013
Angèle makes of a little notebook she found near the road, her confidant, a friend to whom she can tell everything, from the smallest details of her daily life to the hopes and fears of adolescence. For our delight, she paints with delicate touches the lives of day laborers, landlords, winemakers, seamstresses, and so many other inhabitants of Noizay, a village in the Loire Valley of France.
Without pretention, she expresses her feelings, her pleasures and disappointments, as well as her gratitude towards all those who shared her life. Through her simple comments and the questions which preoccupy her thoughts, she reveals to us the deeply ingrained culture and customs of French village life in the late nineteenth century.
The directness of her speech, her natural curiosity, her innocence and common sense, marked by compassion, make of Angèle an endearing figure who will charm children and adults with equal success.