Book – la Petite Conformiste

Book – la Petite Conformiste

By: Ingrid Seyman

Score : 6/10

Year : 2019

Editor : Philippe Rey

ISBN : 9782848767543

Pages : 192

Language : French

Fiction, Book, Contemporary, Novel, (2019), 6*, Drama,

First of all, I must absolutely warn that this story is very depressing, full of trigger warnings and should not be read if one of the 2 most difficult aspects triggers you personally; or at least not to read in case of psycho-emotional fragility.

Additionally, there are several sexual references and scenes, right from the first line. Although it is not a smut/erotic novel, the subject comes up several times.

List of triggers:

Emetophobia. Urophobia. Psychological violence. Parricidal ideation *.

The 2 worst: Domestic violence. Suicide.

Parricidal ideation is written in a very funny way, but I include it in the list of potential triggers.

From the back cover:

Esther is a right-wing child born by chance into a left-wing family in the mid-1970s. At her house, everyone lives naked. And everyone – except her – is eccentric.

His mother is an anti-capitalist secretary who swears by May 68. His father, a pied-noir Jew, wards off his anxiety about an upcoming holocaust by writing lists of tasks to accomplish. In Esther's family, there is also a hyperactive brother and grandparents who nurse their nostalgia for Algeria by playing roulette with chickpeas from couscous. But also a diffuse violence, established by the father, whose worrying manias poison family life.

The little girl's existence will be turned upside down when her parents, steeped in contradictions, decide to send her to school with the enemy: a Catholic school, located in the most bourgeois district of Marseille.

The Little Conformist is a gripping novel, where language acts as a machine gun. It questions our relationship to normality and definitively settles the fate of loves that hurt. It's both funny and serious. Absurd and shocking.

**

The story begins as a satire, Esther, the narrator, talks about her childhood, from the late 1970s until around 1985. Much like the main character and narrator, Momo, in The Life Before Us, Esther describes in a comical way her childhood, the socio-political contradictions of her supposedly 'left-wing' parents, with mixed religion. They are also hippies, having participated in the '68 revolution, and anti-capitalist attitudes, staying naked at home - not to mention the sexual scenes repeated several times during the novel.

The novel is above all a drama; Esther tells a slice of her life, from a young girl until the start of puberty. We mix comic moments with violence in the family - as described in the  backcover, there is a diffuse violence, established by the father, whose worrying manias poison family life. This Franco-Algerian family, disordered and bizarre, also includes, again like Gary's novel mentioned above, moments where Esther feels nauseous, or even a few quick scenes in the toilet, and mentions of urine - cause of the TWs.

Esther's voice is irreverent and sarcastic - for example during criticism of religious beliefs followed only when it suits the characters, but the rules set aside as soon as it bothers - and which is intended to be comical and ironic over the majority of the narration.

I had read a review saying that Esther has a faculty of thought and language equal to that of an adult, which is very improbable, but personally, I did not read the book as a narration 'in its time ' but of an adult Esther who looks back on her past, hence the adult language - especially since her education was relatively advanced during the years of which she remembers the events.

Despite its title and some of Esther's events, I find she's not totally the conformist and right-wing in her budding political ideals, but I guess this is rather an ironic title, in view of her family's supposed left-wing that seems to include more than one asterisk. 

The unexpected twist and the ending left me with a very bitter taste. First, because we have a sensational representation of a mental illness; which on the one hand seems to excuse the inexcusable, but also paints an overly simplistic picture of this disease. Secondly, because we expect a certain freedom to be acquired, and since the turn of the story is tragic, it gives the sensation of an anti-feminist message.

In theory, this book is well written, especially for a first novel; but the bitter and depressing taste really reduced my enjoyment and I don't plan to reread this book.