It will go like the wind, I hope.

It will go like the wind, I hope, this book, this Falaise. This afternoon I met my publisher, Annie Goulet. She wanted to give me the revised manuscript. Countless small corrections, little things are, in reality, for the most part, only the subtle imperfections of a text that has been read and reworked many times.

The other’s perspective is important at this stage, and I intend to accept change requests one after the other. It would be my prerogative as an author to refuse, to stick to my only breath. Now, this wind, this breath of my mind, is only one of many. I’m not one of those who resist. The effort has been made; the silverware is only further polished before being presented on the table.

I was moved by Annie’s warm words. I feel her sincere, nourished by words. She says she likes the characters, the way I described them, leaving them free. The same comment was made to me by a colleague about L’Effet Casimir and the Les Années-rebours. "I didn’t want to finish your novels," she told me, "I didn’t want to leave your characters. "Another friend also told me the same thing, in the same terms, about Falaise that he read not so long ago.

How can we not be happy to hear that? I feel like I’m loved then. Maybe not for my body (anyway, that’s not the purpose of me writing), but my mind anyway. It is already an impressive and humble victory in this world of insensitive people.

Direction January 2015 then. Head for the high winds of February. I am getting back to work, almost three years, on October 22, 2011, after the first writing end (since there were still a few after that...). It looked so long now to me to have written it. This novel celebrates its eleven years of chaotic writing. To submit it and wait, and again this expectation of the publisher who took his time, too.

My previous publisher told me so many times: there is no point in pulling a plant; it will not grow any faster. He was right about that. I catch my breath, so to speak. It’s almost an understatement.