Friday, January 31, the phone calls are raining, the publishers are worried, Jordan Bardella would also be invited to lunch of the Best Sellers of L’Express organized at the Royal Monceau, avenue Hoche, and, “worse”, present on ” Family photo “traditional, the one who counts, they tell us, in the eyes of their authors, that which confirms the quality of their work acclaimed by the general public. Yes, Jordan Bardella is well invited, we do not traffic the list of the year issued by Edistat (which we always reveal on lunch day), and the book of the president of the National Rally, What I’m looking for (Fayard), published on November 9, is in 18th place for the best sales of the year with nearly 190,000 copies to date (175,000 in 2024).
It is a fact, we will not censor any bestseller, essay as fiction. In 2015, Éric Zemmour was also present at our edition feasts For French suicide (Albin Michel)- It must be believed that at the time he felt less sulfur. Just like Philippe de Villiers, guest for The time has come to say what I saw (Albin Michel) in 2016, Christiane Taubira in 2017 for Murmurs to youth (Philippe Rey) or François Hollande in 2019 for Power lessons (Stock). Being on the photo with Bardella while the presidential election is in two years, our authors will never accept it, clamor in substance some publishers.
Monday, February 3. The new falls, the European deputy will indeed be on the shot, the climate does not calm down. The withdrawals are multiplying, between the one who will not come at all and the one who will restore without going through the photo box. In any event, the phenomenal Philippe Boxho, surrounded by his three bestsellers (The dead have the floor,, Interview with a corpse, death oppositeKennes), can lend a hand … We always need a Belgian medical examiner. He will be supported by his compatriot Amélie Nothomb, an absolute recordwoman of lunches of L’Express, and presents this year with The impossible return (Albin Michel). Exit, therefore, Kamel Daoud, Joël Dicker, Gaël Faye, Philippe Collin, the first on our list, whose sales in 2024 have gone over 240,000 copies, to which Mélissa da Costa, Valérie, Valérie Perrin, Thomas Schlesser, Miguel Bonnefoy… In the afternoon, new red alert, on the site of Releasean article evoked the renunciations of certain authors. It’s crazy like this paper and the influenza epidemic wreak havoc at the end of the day. All that remains is to tear the table plans, meticulously dosed, and to recompose them, just as carefully, before recombing them …
“It’s wonderfully intimate”
Wednesday February 5: after ReleaseFrance inter and The letter want to inform their readers of the withdrawals of writers. We have never talked so much (upstream) about the Best-Sellers of L’Express lunch! Finally, the photo, if it takes place, will take place in a small living room, the direction of the Royal Monceau refusing, “for safety” the shooting down of the Grand Staircase of the entrance. 12:20 p.m.: On the pavement, BFMTV journalists and Daily sharpened their cameras and microphones. Not sure they harvest a lot of grain to grind. On our side, we count the presents. The decision is made, there will be no group photo, which, given the number of participants, would look like a small family reunification around Jordan Bardella – which will certainly not want Amélie Nothomb, Maxime Chattam, Philippe Boxho, Jean-Baptiste Andrea, David Foenkinos and Laura Swan.
Little by little, the publishers appear, after climbing upstairs of the Parisian palace. Everyone goes to his word: Denis Olivennes, the president of Editis, Rigolard, “only one being you miss and everything is depopulated”, Olivier Nora, the boss of Grasset, darker, “there are so many more serious things In this world, like Trump’s statements on Gaza “.
About the American president, Amélie Nothomb plays her Belgian humor: “You would have invited Trump, it was the same, I would have come; it’s been twenty-five years since I participated in lunch, it is not Bardella who goes ‘prevent it from attending that one. ” And to continue, cut (very good) Moët in hand and smile on his lips, “it’s wonderfully intimate.” While telling us that the same morning, his publisher Albin Michel received many mails from his readers urging her not to get avenue Hoche. Once at the table, the author of Stupor and tremors is more sharp: “What weakness! We are not free, if we are not able to meet someone we hate. My father was a diplomat, he received Mao Zedong or Berlusconi House is part of life. David Foenkinos then arises, laughing, “you saw the name of the Côtes-du-Rhône served, ‘free fall!'” And to go back to his table.
Before the fifty guests attack smoked salmon, followed by a supreme poultry and a pear tart, the editorial director Eric Chol recalls the history of lunch, the different political personalities invited in the years Previous… and salutes the memory of the very late Sophie Charnavel, the editor of Robert Laffont, died on September 16, 2024 at the age of 47. Anne Rosencher, the delegated director, pays tribute to the Franco-Algerian Boualem Sansal: “On November 16, the Algiers regime imprisoned a writer for what he had said. Faced with this simple statement, which should make it stand up. ‘Importance, some people are silent or quibble. Fight, as a free man.
We are also serious at the table of Jordan Bardella, composed of his publisher, Nicolas Diat, and journalists from L’Express. His readings of the moment? The cleaning lady (I read), from Freida McFadden, of which he also judged the beginning “really not bad” before concluding that it was rather a novel for 17 -year -old adolescent. “My writers are dead,” he boasts. And what about this literary world that disdains it? He “counters”. He did not know the time of the demonization of his party; At 29, the president of the national rally assures that he can exchange with great bosses as with a former Prime Minister, therefore these authors who flee him … “They are snobs,” he evacuates. And given the number of readers and voters he gathered in the last European elections, he assumes that he, with these novelists who refuse to meet him, a common audience. Jordan Bardella makes politics, he knows that these defections, these absences, will serve him to nourish the discourse on his belonging to the margin. Neither he nor Marine Le Pen, belong to the “system”, whether political or media. And being able to demonstrate it remains essential, it is the key to their success.
“He’s a very good one, in fact”
Nearby, some publishers cannot help sliding an eye on Jordan Bardella’s table. Their conversation revolves around this central question: should we publish these extreme right figures? A publisher says that he had the memoirs of Jean-Marie Le Pen in his hands but that he did not find the text interesting enough to follow up. Another remembers a phone call to offer her the book of Marine Le Pen, which she refused without even looking at him because it was not her editorial line. A last narrative wanted to publish a sulphurous character of another kind and to have been retained by the people of his publishing house. “When you have 90 % of people against you, it’s impossible,” he said, a bit disappointed but resigned. And the discussion to continue, already, on the start of the school year in September and on these authors that they argue from one house to another.
Manuel Carcassonne, the director general of Stock, does not see so far, all excited that he is by the publication in April of Tristan’s invention D’ADRIE BOSC, Surveillance of Tristan Egolf who was to go out at Gallimard but was deprogrammed – Tristan Egolf, the noticed author of the Lord of Porchies committed suicide in May 2005, at the age of 33. The boss of Albin Michel Gilles Haéri speaks of economics and telework with Denis Olivennes, who is also his author since he has just published France must work more… Susanna Lea, Marc Levy’s co -editor, broods with her new golden eggs hen, Philippe Boxho, whose agent she has recently been and whose rights have been sold in around thirty countries including China! A doctor who will not be asked, the lunch flowing very calmly. So much so that at the end of the meal, an editor entrusts his neighbor of the table about Jordan Bardella: “He is someone very well high, in fact. He did not try to attract attention “. No, just to make this 26th the most chaotic and publicized edition of the decade.
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