FOREIGN RIGHTS SPRING 2012
PICTURE BOOKS LUNA-PARK IN PYJAMARAMA / TROUN AND THE MUSICAL BIRD (P. 3) ANT / MILLIPEDE / PLUPK (P. 4) TONIO / THE BIG AMERICAIN HOLE / WHERE? (P. 5)
KID’S NOVELS THE INVENTION OF PARENTS / MOVING HOUSE (P. 6)
CHILDREN’S NOVELS
Striped pyjamas are perfect for resurrecting the age-old cinematic technique of Ombro cinema! After the first few pages of the story, the child falls asleep and suddenly everything in the book goes crazy. Suddenly, the air is filled with the aroma of popcorn, loud music, and explosions. What? It’s party time! There are dodgems, big wheels, stunts and chaos all the fun of the funfair bundled into one spectacular LUNAPARC. Frédérique Bertrand tells the story, while Michaël Leblond provides the tactile graphics that magically come to life when they meet a striped Acetate. The second work on the “Pyjamarama” series, after the first adventure in New York. 4 years + • 24 x 32 • 24 pages • €16.50
BLACK BIG / THE DOGS ON THE PENINSULAR (P. 7) WHO KILLED MICHKA? / THE BEST NIGHT EVER (P. 8)
YOUNG ADULT NOVELS SUMMER’S PLAN B / ME AND THE WEDDELL SEA (P. 9) THE DAY I BECAME A WRITER / MA (P. 10)
TROUN AND THE MUSICAL BIRD Author / Illustrator: Elzbieta
TEEN THRILLERS THE TALISMAN BOY / ANKA (P. 11)
One day, Troun crawled out of the sea. Having crossed the beach, he climbed to the top of a hill, where he opened his ears to listen. To the sound of work in the fields, to the pitter-pattering of rain, to the sighing of the wind, to the birds singing and so much more. “Wow,” he thinks, “All those sounds! Resonating together, they have their own music! Say! Maybe I could be a musician too?” Accompanied by his friends, Troun uses all he has to make his own music. The only trouble is: when all those sounds are put together, is it really music? The book, with its music written by composer Sharon Kanach, has met with huge success in nursery and primary schools and inspired many early music workshops. 5 years + • 20 x 26 • 48 pages • €15.20
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Author: Michaël Leblond Illustrator: Frédérique Bertrand
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LUNA-PARK IN PYJAMARAMA
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PICTURE BOOKS
TONIO ANT
Author / Illustrator: Olivier Douzou
An ant sets out for walk across a bear. The bear is white; the ant is black. The bear doesn’t budge an inch, and the ant wanders all the way around. Gradually, the little ant sketches out the bear’s claws, brows, collar and spectacles. The ant ventures into the most dangerous places. And all the while, imperturbable, the big white bear still doesn’t budge an inch. 2 years + • 17 x 23 • 24 pages • €13.70
Author / Illustrator: Gaëtan Dorémus
To counteract their boredom a snake, a butterfly, a bird and a panther, on a island lost in the middle of the sea, decide to make their own creature in their own image and bring it to life. But their newfound friend starts behaving in the strangest ways, with faculties far removed from those of its creators. Their hope of a perfectly composed creature with perfect capabilities is dashed and the animals struggle to cope with its antics. Worse: they can’t even decide what to call it. Tonio finds a simple and original solution to what turns into a genuine problem of projection, hybridisation, parenthood and ultimately of existence. 6 years + • 21.5 x 30 • 40 pages • €16
MILLIPEDE
Author / Illustrator: Jean Gourounas
THE BIG AMERICAN HOLE
For learning to count to 1000 with no mistakes! When you start drawing a millipede, there are choices to make. Once you start there’s no turning back, even if the temptation for exploration, experimentation and the pursuit of beauty can become too much. The millipede is at the mercy of its inventor’s moods and uncertainties, a victim of the slightest doubt and desire for a change of colour. Ultimately, you must make sure you’ve drawn sufficient legs and that’s when things get tricky. 3 years + • 17 x 22 • 32 pages • €13.20
Author / Illustrator: Michel Galvin
Michel Galvin dreams the American dream and celebrates its inventiveness, but also demonstrates its imperfections, such as the big hole for multiplying everything. At first, the hole is a brilliant idea, but it soon gets out of control with unexpected repercussions. Like TVs of the age, black and white gradually gives way to colour. Is it a game or is it reality? A memory or a possible future? Or an original tribute to progress that not even the Great American Dream can stop? 6 years + • 21 x 29.7 • 32 pages • €15.70
PLUPK
Author: Olivier Douzou Illustrator: Natali Fortier
WHERE
Plupk does like the tale of Tom Thumb, but it also frightens him a little! It makes Plupk worry whether his parents are poor and whether, one day, they too will have to abandon him in the forest. He puts down his book and goes out to gather pebbles. He picks up one then another, before venturing deeper inside to gather another from the forest floor. Inside the forest is a long trail of pebbles: clearly, someone has been lost here before. When he turns around to go home, his house has disappeared. He is totally lost. In this topsy-turvy fairytale, a child poses a whole of questions before becoming totally caught up in his own imagination: this, after all, is what makes children so wonderful. 6 years + • 21 x 29.7 • 40 pages • €15
This succinct title nicely sums up this tale of a curious woodcutter who sets out to cut some wood but can’t find the trees. Where has the forest gone? The man can’t see the wood for the trees and keeps passing them by, heading off in all directions, as though he’s forgotten what he set out to do. Lurking in the forest is one tree that might hold the answer to his question. With brio, José Parrondo recounts this silent journey, which is apparently absurd at first reading, but so poetic when you retrace the footsteps of the stumpy woodcutter. The black and white illustrations are disarmingly naïve and provide a perfect complement to the iconography of video games with which children might well be familiar. 5 years + • 15 x 18.5 • 120 pages • €17 approx.
Author / Illustrator: José Parrondo
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KID’S NOVELS
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CHILDREN’S NOVELS
THE INVENTION OF PARENTS
BLACK BIG
Author: Agnès de Lestrade Illustrator: Lucie Albon
Author: Sébastien Joanniez Illustrator: Daniela Tieni
Aimée is a little girl who lives in a home. She misses the love and affection parents provide, especially after school when Aimée watches her best friend Clémence launch herself into her mothers’ arms. She does have Amina and Shirley, her soul sisters and roommates at the home. But they’re not the same as a real family. So Aimée decides to create her own mother by cutting out a paper shape and drawing on a face. She is a handy mother to have as Aimée can slip her in a pocket and take her wherever she goes. One day, panic-stricken, she realises she has left her mum in the pocket of her jeans and her jeans have gone to wash. Her friends are curious to find out what Aimée has hidden in her pocket that is so valuable: they decide it must be a love letter. What if Aimée is in love with Medhi? From this misunderstanding, Aimée discovers that love is not so unattractive after all! 7 years + • 12 x 17 • 64 pages • €6.50 approx.
He might well have white parents, talk with the same accent as the locals and be a gifted angler, but the colour of his skin sets him out as a perfect scapegoat within the small isolated country village where he lives. Wounded by the things people say, he is afraid of hurting his parents by confiding in them. So he plays truant and wanders the fields and streams instead of going to lessons, because fields and streams don’t care about colour. Things have to change. But how? An encounter with an old woman helps change the way he thinks. And a teacher at school enlightens her pupils about the importance of tolerance and acceptance. Then his blind mother offers him a camera. 10 years + • 14 x 19 • 64 pages • 4 colours • €11.50
THE DOGS ON THE PENINSULAR MOVING HOUSE
Author: Cécile Chartre Illustrator: Charlotte des Ligneris
One evening, Alexandre’s mother shouted a lot. Then, taking her son under one arm and his cat Jean-Claude under the other, she slammed the front door, leaving dad repeating over and over how sorry he was. Ever since then, so much has changed. First the three of them move into a new house in town. Then Jean-Claude disappears when his mother throws the cat out of the window because he wet the bed. What’s more, Alexandre has started wetting the bed too. His mother tries everything she can, but she can’t put the smile back on Alexandre’s face. Until one day, when he asks to see his daddy again. A father is after all a father, even if he does have a new house and family. After that, things take a turn for the better: Alexandre finds Jean-Claude and learns how to smile again. Furthermore, now he has two houses, Mum’s and Dad’s, and that’s not such a bad thing after all. 7 years + • 12 x 17 • 80 pages • €7.10
Author: Ahmed Kalouaz
Childéric and his parents spend the month of August in a rented holiday home in Brittany. Every summer, they also “hire a grandparent” to take care of Childéric so that he doesn’t get bored. This year, a granddaddy turns up in his sidecar with his dog Lasco. M. Signol soon starts getting along well with Childéric and it is not long before the boy starts calling him granddad! As they are out walking Lasco, they are warned that a serial dog-napper is on the loose. A number of dogs have gone mysteriously missing recently. The story has been headline news in the local paper. M. Signol, Childéric and Lasco set out on the trail of the dog-napper on the old timer’s motorbike. Their trail leads them down many blind allies but thanks to Lasco’s sense of smell they find out where the dogs have been hidden. Through the adventures and encounters he shares with M. Signol, Childéric spends an unforgettable month of August. 9 years + • 12 x 17 • 160 pages • €9
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YOUNG ADULT NOVELS
WHO KILLED MICHKA?
Author: Irène Cohen-Janca
Nora should be happy: the whole family has just moved into a huge house. But since, Nora doesn’t feel well, she’s even started playing up at school. Is it because she has changed house? Or because a little sister has just arrived in the family? Why doesn’t her mother call her “My little angel” anymore? Also preying on Nora’s mind is the disappearance of Michka, her fluffy teddy bear, whom she lost in the move. Michka was more than a teddy bear to her: he was her confidant and Nora confided all her secrets to him. Nora is terrified that someone has found him and found out all about her. One day, in her mother’s sewing case, she chances upon a small patch of felt that looks very much like Michka’s paw. Does Nora’s mother know where Michka is ? 9 years + • 12 x 17 • 64 pages • €6.60
SUMMER’S PLAN B
Author: Hélène Vignal
For six months, Louise and her best friend Theo have been dreaming of going camping in Bénodet, in Brittany. They are due to set out with Louise’s mother but, at the last moment, she has to stand in for a colleague at work. Louise finds herself confined to her grandmother’s house, while Theo is lumbered with staying at home with his parents. Louise can only see one solution: convince her grandmother to go camping with them. This is no easy business. Jamie is no ordinary grandmother, but an old lady with very complicated rituals who is terrified by the slightest change to her routine. Louise starts wondering: “Who is my grandmother? Why does she live so separately to everyone?” Time is running out and if Louise is going to encourage her to go camping, she’ll have to act fast to sort things out. Louise starts rummaging through her grandmother’s perfectly tidy drawers and Jamie’s surprising secrets emerge. 13 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 224 pages approx. • €13 approx.
THE BEST NIGHT EVER Author: Sévérine Vidal
Raphaël and Colombe meet and fall in love, and then Raphaël is brought crashing back down to earth when his parents forbid him to see Colombe again. He can’t understand: You mean I’m not allowed to fall in love just because I’m 12? But Colombe is an inventive girl and soon, in secret, they are plotting to spend “the best night ever” together in the empty house belonging to Raphaël’s grandmother, with the help of Raphaël’s brother, Julien, who is to play the mayor, witness and best man for their improvised wedding ceremony. After the ceremony, the young lovers celebrate together and have a great time before they snuggle up in bed as good as gold. Suddenly they are woken by strange noises. The “best night ever” soon turns into a nightmare when the house next door catches fire and Colombe and Raphaël are forced to escape. Naturally, they have to go home and confront the anger and anguish of their parents who have discovered their goingson! But their parents also realize that love is not only for adults. 9 years + •12 x 17 • 96 pages • €7.50
ME AND THE WEDDELL SEA Author: Arnaud Tiercelin
Marius, 14, realises he is different to everyone: his light is on, but often nobody’s home. He is an antisocial creature, living out of kilter with the rest of the world. His big dream is to go diving in the Weddell Sea in Antarctica and live among the whales and penguins. His older brother, Vincent’s, dream meanwhile is more to the liking of his parents: Vincent wants to work in finance. So, his parents agree to pay to put him through a private business school in Bordeaux. It’s a difficult year for Marius now that his brother has gone. Marius isn’t a big fan of lolling in front of the television with his parents and taking Sunday lunch with his grandfather. When Vincent returns home for the weekend, Marius can barely recognise him with his hair cut short. The situation with his girlfriend Daphne is no better, even if she is the prettiest girl in the school. Daphne can’t stop kissing him; he just wants to be left alone. One day, after Marius has broken up with Daphne and his parents are away, Marius decides to jump on a train to Bordeaux. What he discovers there turns his life around: his brother has been thrown out of business school and has taken to hanging around the university, which is on strike. Marcus meets a certain Juliette, who makes him forget the Weddell Sea. 13 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 192 pages • €12.20
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TEEN THRILLERS
Author: Vincent Cuvellier
“Why did you become a writer?” is a question Vincent Cuvellier has been asked a thousand times since the release of Kilomètre zéro, by Rouergue, in 2001, a work which saw the start of his talented career. He might now be a successful children’s author but his own childhood was not such a glowing success. Vincent left school at 15 and went through years of hassle: pointless internships, odd jobs, and unemployment. From a working class background, he lacked confidence in himself and was an angry-young-teen. But back then, he did at least know one thing: that he adored writing and dreamt of becoming a writer. One day he took part in a major literary competition and won. His career took off and his first novel, La troisième vie, was published when he was just 16. But sixteen years passed between this first success and his second with Rouergue. And during this time, he gained a clearer sense of his style and of his readers, while developing his humour and freedom of imagination. Many readers will recognise themselves in the teen Vincent, a child full of energy yet totally at sea. Here he provides a valuable lesson in life, in strength and in writing. 11 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 80 pages • €8.50
MA
Author: Louis Atangana
In the heart of an African village lost in the forest is a hut where live Ma Eleonore, a mysterious woman, and her son Felix. Others believe Ma Éléonore is a witch. She has no friends, except Jonas, who has returned to the village after living in France for 30 years. Jonas is an intriguing character who manages to reopen the school but who causes unrest by telling the youth of the village how easy life in Europe is. Felix too dreams of leaving the lost village one day, to Ma’s great chagrin. All she can see are old age and solitude on the horizon and her fears grow when her son meets a young girl, Magali. Magali also has secrets: two years ago, she suddenly appeared out of the forest, but nobody knows from where. There is something untamed in Magali and she lets nobody near her. People say she is Satan’s daughter. But Magali is beautiful and Felix falls in love with her. When Ma finally reveals to him the secret of his birth, he runs away to live in the forest with Magali. Felix teaches Magali to read and write. She is a fast learner. Soon memories of her former life return and she starts to write them down. Louis Atangana tells a fable of Africa today, full of beauty and legends but also painfully torn apart by war. It is also the tale of a passage to an adult age and a beautiful love story between two very different teenage children. 13 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 96 pages • €9
THE TALISMAN BOY
Author: Florence Aubry
Heinrich lives hidden down by the docks. He is a hunted child. Nobody knows why. “Will they just take a part of me, or all of me?” he wonders. They are “The Others”, the people who look normal, in a country that resembles our own, in a country where Heinrich and his people are forced to live hidden from man and sunshine for they are seen as “children of the devil”, the Zeru Zeru. Val is 17, the same age as Heinrich. Her sister, Aurore, is dying and the doctors cannot do anything for her. “You could try the Witchdoctor,” they tell him. The Witchdoctor lives in a high-tech tower block and claims to be able to cure all ills. But to cure Aurore, he requires a special ingredient and getting hold of this ingredient is dangerous. They have to visit the gold washers. Joseph was once a gold washer and now lives in the middle of nowhere. The paths of Heinrich, Val and Joseph cross, when Val goes to see Joseph to find what he is looking for. Joseph wants money so that he can keep his shack and not end up in a retirement home. Heinrich, meanwhile, possesses what the Witchdoctor wants from Val: hair, for use in healing magic, or for purposes more sinister. Mutilated bodies are often found; people use the hair and flesh of the Zeru Zeru to make talismans. Heinrich is abducted and confined by Joseph. The old man and the teenager grow to trust each other. All the while the state of Aurore’s health declines. 13 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 144 pages • €10.50
ANKA
Author: Guillaume Guéraud
Marco is alone at home when two policemen knock at his door to tell him his mother is dead. No sooner have they left than the door opens again and his mother walks in, alive. His mother is indeed not dead; it is his father’s official wife, the woman he wedded for convenience ten years ago, who has died. His father needed money and was put in contact with a young Romanian woman requiring a resident’s visa, for which she paid 1,500 euros. Marco is a rebellious teen, who dreams of destroying the system. He cannot shake the news of the young woman’s death out of his head. He cannot work out why. Is it the young woman’s radiant face that he first encounters on the resident’s visa found in the bag she was carrying when she died, which his father retrieved? We go on to discover the young woman’s story and what led the young woman to die in the street. 14 years + • 14 x 20.5 • 112 pages • €9.50
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THE DAY I BECAME A WRITER
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TEEN THRILLERS
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18, rue SÊguier - 75006 Paris - France e-mail: info@lerouergue.com Johanna Brock Lacassin • Foreign Rights B.P. 90038 - 13633 Arles cedex France - Tel: +33 (0)4 90 49 57 25 Fax: +33 (0)4 90 96 95 25 e-mail: j.brock-lacassin@actes-sud.fr