In 1943, somewhere in eastern France. Young Carl learns from Father de Larnes, the director of the school where he is a boarder, that both his parents died in a bombing. He then decides to join his good friend Henri Volane in Algiers, where he has gone to find refuge with his father. But the trip to North Africa does not go as planned. Carl must hide in the open countryside with young STO draft dodgers but, to overcome the boredom that is eating away at him, he decides to make himself useful and participates in an act of resistance. Taken prisoner by the Germans, he is sent to Poland, to the Treblinka concentration camp. It is there that he finds Henri. Together, they decide to escape. But Henri is mown down by the camp guards' bullets. Before dying, he encourages Carl to return to France to take his identity and thus inherit his father's estate...
Be careful, under this (long) somewhat linear summary of the very beginning of this novel, hides a much more complex story that has its roots in the Antiquity of Socrates and Plato. Because the whole plot of this novel is based on a mysterious secret that Socrates, just before dying, is said to have bequeathed to his disciple. Plato, having himself lost his most brilliant student Philip, is said to have decided to create a sort of secret society in charge of revealing the secret when Humanity would be ready to receive it. Of course, I can't really tell you more, since, as you can imagine, the revelations about this famous secret will be made to us at the very end. So, no need to spoil the pleasure for you...
...This novel is Antoine Cantenot's first, therefore. And for a first attempt, the author born in 1959 does not hesitate to take his reader on a journey and he does so in a remarkable way...
...There you go, we would like to read such good first novels every day and I thank Babelio for allowing me this discovery thanks to the Masse Critique operation. I can only invite you to read it, because, I am sure, you will not regret the journey!
