Diverse French book recs?

November 22, 2022 5:39 AM

I have a 15-euro amazon.fr gift card I need to use up soon and am looking for Kindle recommendations. Snowflakes inside.

As mentioned up top, I have 15 euros to spend in the French Kindle store and no idea what to spend it on.

In English, I read mostly pop histories (Salt, anything by Mary Roach, The Professor and the Madman) YA and adult fantasy (but no dystopias - that's what the news is for) or romance (historical or fantasy, rarely contemporary).

I tried looking for recommendations in French, but everything that came up was by, as best as I could tell, by a cis straight white dude. Does anyone have recommendations for a book(s) under 15 euros that ticks the following boxes:

- fantasy, pop history, or romance, light and fluffy over Serious or (worse) Literature. No sad endings or dystopias, please
- by someone other than a cis white dude
- available on Kindle
- standalone
- focused on women, or at least that has good female characters. Good queer rep would be a great bonus.

Translations are also fine, whether from English or other languages.

TIA

posted by Tamanna to Media & Arts (4 answers total)

Moi, Tituba sorcière... Noire de Salem! This is an older book (80s?) and I recently read it in English translation and adored it to the point where it's very much on my list to read again in French. The ending could be read as sad, and maybe it's too Serious? (And sorry, I think it probably is Literature.) But it's also surprising, much more fun than I expected, extremely weird, and meets all your other requirements.
posted by mskyle at 6:01 AM on November 22, 2022

I read Leonardo Da Vinci: The Renaissance of the World (graphic biography illustrated by a queer woman; I don't know anything about the writer).
posted by spiderbeforesunset at 3:13 PM on November 22, 2022

Something by Annie Ernaux, maybe, who won the Nobel prize this year.

Can you get Les années for 15 euro?

There's an interesting piece about her in last week's New Yorker.
posted by zadcat at 4:13 PM on November 22, 2022

If you're open to BDs,
- Culottées by Pénélope Bagieu
- translations of Liv Strömquist (e.g. La Rose la plus rouge s'épanouit)
- Un autre regard by Emma
posted by orchidee at 3:24 AM on November 23, 2022