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In Every Wave
A man loses his daughter while swimming one summer. This little gem of a novella - sad and beautiful and spellbinding all at once - is the tale of how he strives to be reunited with her again, whether back home on dry land or thousands of miles underwater. Racked with guilt and doubt, he lingers over her memory, refusing to let her go. He imagines and reimagines the moment she slipped away from him as he searches for her behind every rock, in every bush, in every wave.
70 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2018
2 people are currently reading
148 people want to read
About the author
Charles Quimper
9 books10 followersNé à Québec en 1977, Charles Quimper tenta d’abord de se faire pêcheur de homard avant de réaliser qu’il était atteint d’un mal de mer insurmontable. Il devint alors installateur de piscines hors terre et vendeur de fermetures éclair, avant de devenir libraire puis collaborateur à plusieurs revues et magazines. Marée montante est son premier roman, et Tout explose son premier recueil de poésie.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
October 27, 2018
Coming in at 70 pages, In Every Wave is an emotionally-charged novella.
As In Every Wave unfolds, a father shares his grief over the loss of his daughter. His feelings are complex because there is also guilt. But why? His young daughter is lost to the sea when she was in his care.
As the father recounts the story, I felt empathy at his derailment and utter despair. He is desperate to explain himself and to pinpoint what happened, but even more than that, he is searching for her.
In Every Wave is a tender and thought-provoking novella, and I’m grateful I read it. The writing is exquisite and the emotion impactful. There is no greater gift than when an author’s writing makes us feel deeply.
Thank you to QC Fiction for the opportunity to read this treasure. All opinions are my own.
As In Every Wave unfolds, a father shares his grief over the loss of his daughter. His feelings are complex because there is also guilt. But why? His young daughter is lost to the sea when she was in his care.
As the father recounts the story, I felt empathy at his derailment and utter despair. He is desperate to explain himself and to pinpoint what happened, but even more than that, he is searching for her.
In Every Wave is a tender and thought-provoking novella, and I’m grateful I read it. The writing is exquisite and the emotion impactful. There is no greater gift than when an author’s writing makes us feel deeply.
Thank you to QC Fiction for the opportunity to read this treasure. All opinions are my own.
November 15, 2018
This devastated father’s ode to his lost daughter is sad, poignant yes, but also unnerving.
My review for Temz Review can be found here: https://www.thetemzreview.com/schreib...
My review for Temz Review can be found here: https://www.thetemzreview.com/schreib...
January 5, 2017
Un récit poétique et imagé sur le deuil parental. Très court, très touchant et très beau.
May 19, 2018
Le cœur sur la corde raide de la première à la dernière page.
"Je suis une étoile mourante, une supernova à la lumière incertaine. Il me reste encore un peu de force dans les doigts et quelque part sous mes côtes. Il est inévitable qu'en te cherchant assez longtemps, je te retrouve enfin." (p. 11)
"Sais-tu que dans certains pays où le climat est très sec, les habitants ont installé d'amples filets au sommet des montagnes couvertes de nuages ? La brume se laisse emprisonner, s'attarde puis glisse vers les villages un peu plus bas.
Tu es un filet tendu en moi." (p. 53)
"Je suis une étoile mourante, une supernova à la lumière incertaine. Il me reste encore un peu de force dans les doigts et quelque part sous mes côtes. Il est inévitable qu'en te cherchant assez longtemps, je te retrouve enfin." (p. 11)
"Sais-tu que dans certains pays où le climat est très sec, les habitants ont installé d'amples filets au sommet des montagnes couvertes de nuages ? La brume se laisse emprisonner, s'attarde puis glisse vers les villages un peu plus bas.
Tu es un filet tendu en moi." (p. 53)
January 17, 2019
Possibly too short to even be called a novella.
“Every day is the day you died.”
A powerful lament for a lost daughter.
“Every day is the day you died.”
A powerful lament for a lost daughter.
December 17, 2020
At first I felt uncomfortable reading this, intruding on someone's grief. It is a very intimate and personal piece. But slowly, and this short novel demands being read slowly, the imagery and language Quimper uses changed the way I felt, and that it was intended to be shared, but only to those who can adjust to its delicate subject matter, and the frame of mind required.
It is not a novella to analyse by a reviewer in any depth, and much better approached without any preconceptions.
Enough to say that it is about a father trying to hold his world together after the tragic death of his young daughter during a summer holiday.
It is not a novella to analyse by a reviewer in any depth, and much better approached without any preconceptions.
Enough to say that it is about a father trying to hold his world together after the tragic death of his young daughter during a summer holiday.
April 30, 2022
Une vague d'émotions, tout simplement. Comment peut-on survivre à la mort de notre enfant? Naviguer entre les souvenirs, heureux et malheureux, la douleur de la perte de l'autre, le désespoir, la noirceur, la folie qui peut finir par nous habiter.
C'était touchant, dur, pesant, mais tendre à la fois. La mort d'un enfant, c'est aussi, trop souvent, la dérive d'un couple.
Je suis emplie d'émotions, d'images. Une lecture qui vient nécessairement nous chercher. À lire une fois. Vraiment.
C'était touchant, dur, pesant, mais tendre à la fois. La mort d'un enfant, c'est aussi, trop souvent, la dérive d'un couple.
Je suis emplie d'émotions, d'images. Une lecture qui vient nécessairement nous chercher. À lire une fois. Vraiment.
October 24, 2020
Lecture poignante dans laquelle on dérive dans la détresse et la douleur d’un père qui a perdu sa fille. L’écriture est poétique. Mes yeux se sont délectés malgré l’horreur qui est décrit. C’est un livre qui ne laisse pas le coeur indemne.
November 6, 2022
Frappant. Poignant. J’ai adoré le style d’écriture.
February 5, 2020
Une écriture imagée, un roman tendre et tragique à la fois 😢
August 22, 2018
In Every Wave is a lament for a lost child, a lost marriage and conclusively, a loss of meaning and purpose in one's life. I'm sure everyone who reads this book will get something different out of it. Full review here: http://bit.ly/ineverywave
March 6, 2020
Dans ce tout petit livre, on plonge dans le chagrin d'un père comme on se jette à la mer sans bouée de sauvetage! Les eaux qui ont fait chaviré sa vie demeurent troubles, mais les détails sont inutiles puisque la peine, la culpabilité et surtout l'amour restent les mêmes peu importe les circonstances de la perte.
Dans une prose simple, sensible et très imagée, l'auteur nous embarque pour un voyage improbable à la recherche de ce qui a été perdu pour toujours. C'est triste, mais c'est aussi très beau et lumineux. Une belle découverte!
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Dans une prose simple, sensible et très imagée, l'auteur nous embarque pour un voyage improbable à la recherche de ce qui a été perdu pour toujours. C'est triste, mais c'est aussi très beau et lumineux. Une belle découverte!
Visitez mon blog : https://chroniquesbookaddict.wixsite....
Suivez-moi sur Facebook :
https://www.facebook.com/Les-chroniqu...
March 17, 2024
QC Fiction is an imprint of Baraka Books, a small indie publisher in Montreal. It specialises in fiction from French-speaking Canada, translated into English. Since the summer of 2016, QC Fiction has published three novels in translation every year, most of which were finalists or longlisted for literary prizes including the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Governor General’s Literary Awards.
My introduction to QC Fiction came through In Every Wave, a 70-page novella by Charles Quimper, superbly translated by Guil Lefebvre. The young daughter of the novella’s narrator drowns while swimming one summer. Her distraught father becomes obsessed with water and the sea, believing that the girl he lost somehow lives on in them. As his marriage unravels, he sets off on a journey across the oceans, determined to seek the elusive ghost of his loved child.
Or, at least, that’s the impression given in the initial pages of the novella. Reading on, we realise that we are in the company of an unreliable narrator, whose mind is collapsing under the weight of grief. And it is grief tinged with guilt – tellingly, every time he tries to recall the events of the tragic day, the story he tells is different, his role amplified with each retelling.
So is the sea voyage described in the novella literal, or should we read it metaphorically? Tantalisingly, In Every Wave lets us reach our own conclusions. Whatever the interpretation we give it however, this novella is an intense, poetic – and often unbearably poignant – experience.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/20...
My introduction to QC Fiction came through In Every Wave, a 70-page novella by Charles Quimper, superbly translated by Guil Lefebvre. The young daughter of the novella’s narrator drowns while swimming one summer. Her distraught father becomes obsessed with water and the sea, believing that the girl he lost somehow lives on in them. As his marriage unravels, he sets off on a journey across the oceans, determined to seek the elusive ghost of his loved child.
Or, at least, that’s the impression given in the initial pages of the novella. Reading on, we realise that we are in the company of an unreliable narrator, whose mind is collapsing under the weight of grief. And it is grief tinged with guilt – tellingly, every time he tries to recall the events of the tragic day, the story he tells is different, his role amplified with each retelling.
So is the sea voyage described in the novella literal, or should we read it metaphorically? Tantalisingly, In Every Wave lets us reach our own conclusions. Whatever the interpretation we give it however, this novella is an intense, poetic – and often unbearably poignant – experience.
https://endsoftheword.blogspot.com/20...
October 22, 2018
“Piercing and compact, Charles Quimper’s novella In Every Wave follows a grief-consumed father through a vortex of regret and fragmented fantasies. Here, sorrow is an ocean, and lost possibilities lurk behind every swell […] Every phrase is a foghorn, and every utterance rasps. Almost too tender to touch...” (★★★★★, Foreword Reviews)
“one of the most touching books I have ever read […] a real gem” (Stuart John Allen, Winstonsdad's Blog)
“a short, heart-rending piece that lingers in the mind long after the last page is turned. […] well worth reading” (Tony Malone, Tony's Reading List)
“a multi-layered tale of unbearable sadness […] impressive. ★★★★★” (James Fisher, The Miramichi Reader)
“The book is beautifully written, in a translation by Guil Lefebvre that is exemplary.” (Lisa Hill, ANZ LitLovers LitBlog)
“Quimper takes us to places most of us hope never to go in real life, creating a work of art out of imagined catastrophe. [...] QC Fiction continue to produce an impressively varied and consistently interesting sequence of prose fiction titles.” Simon Lavery, Tredynas Days
Coming soon and we can't wait! Neither can you? Pre-order now at qcfiction.com and discover Guil Lefebvre's beautiful translation of Charles Quimper's Marée montante (Éditions Alto) for yourself.
“one of the most touching books I have ever read […] a real gem” (Stuart John Allen, Winstonsdad's Blog)
“a short, heart-rending piece that lingers in the mind long after the last page is turned. […] well worth reading” (Tony Malone, Tony's Reading List)
“a multi-layered tale of unbearable sadness […] impressive. ★★★★★” (James Fisher, The Miramichi Reader)
“The book is beautifully written, in a translation by Guil Lefebvre that is exemplary.” (Lisa Hill, ANZ LitLovers LitBlog)
“Quimper takes us to places most of us hope never to go in real life, creating a work of art out of imagined catastrophe. [...] QC Fiction continue to produce an impressively varied and consistently interesting sequence of prose fiction titles.” Simon Lavery, Tredynas Days
Coming soon and we can't wait! Neither can you? Pre-order now at qcfiction.com and discover Guil Lefebvre's beautiful translation of Charles Quimper's Marée montante (Éditions Alto) for yourself.
November 25, 2017
Une écriture des plus charmante et une histoire profondément touchante. Malheureusement, j'ai trouvé que le tout tombait un peu dans l'apitoiement et la répétition, oui je sais c'est un peu ce qu'est le deuil, mais d'un point de vue strictement littéraire, cela est un peu moins intéressant. Sinon, c'est très bien!
October 17, 2018
Sublime translation.
February 14, 2017
Ça laisse sans voix.
April 25, 2017
C'est beau, c'est touchant.
August 23, 2017
"Comment une catastrophe comme la nôtre peut-elle ne pas affecter le cycle des marées, l'inclinaison de la Terre ou le cours de la Bourse ?"
Un court récit poignant, douloureux et magnifique.
Un court récit poignant, douloureux et magnifique.
August 31, 2019
Captivée dès les premières lignes, j'ai repris mon souffle à la dernière, une mer dans les yeux et le coeur dans un étau. J'ai dérivé avec la douleur de ce père. Magnifiquement poétique.
October 20, 2018
This is unsettling reading...
It's the story of a man’s grief for the daughter he has lost, and how that grief derails him. It is narrated by the distraught father, in snatches of memory intersecting with his perceptions of how he is coping now. At first our sympathies are with him— how could they not be? But as the story progresses the reader becomes disorientated by the discrepancies in three different versions of the girl’s disappearance. Ostensibly, he is speaking to his lost child. But to whom, really, is he telling these stories, if not himself ? To his wife, to offset the blame for failing to watch the child by the water? To his friends, to deflect their judgement that he’s an irresponsible parent? Is he rehearsing a plausible tale for the police and the coroner? Or is it that his memories of that day have become distorted by the other times that there was a momentary distraction? Is this a cautionary tale to warn parents about the potential for fatal consequences when momentary distractions prevail? (I look at the behaviour of parents in public places when they are absorbed in their phones and I despair sometimes for the future of their lonely little children).
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/10/20/i...
It's the story of a man’s grief for the daughter he has lost, and how that grief derails him. It is narrated by the distraught father, in snatches of memory intersecting with his perceptions of how he is coping now. At first our sympathies are with him— how could they not be? But as the story progresses the reader becomes disorientated by the discrepancies in three different versions of the girl’s disappearance. Ostensibly, he is speaking to his lost child. But to whom, really, is he telling these stories, if not himself ? To his wife, to offset the blame for failing to watch the child by the water? To his friends, to deflect their judgement that he’s an irresponsible parent? Is he rehearsing a plausible tale for the police and the coroner? Or is it that his memories of that day have become distorted by the other times that there was a momentary distraction? Is this a cautionary tale to warn parents about the potential for fatal consequences when momentary distractions prevail? (I look at the behaviour of parents in public places when they are absorbed in their phones and I despair sometimes for the future of their lonely little children).
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/10/20/i...
August 23, 2018
"You went under, and I’ve been at sea ever since, searching for you in every wave."
And, just like that, IN EVERY WAVE (Guil Lefebvre's beautiful début translation of Charles Quimper's Marée montante, Éditions Alto) is off to the printer's.
"a multi-layered tale of unbearable sadness... impressive. ★★★★★” (James Fisher, The Miramichi Reader)
"simply one of the most touching books I have ever read" - Stuart John Allen, the translated-fiction blogger behind the #TranslationThurs hashtag, on Twitter
Out this October from QC Fiction!
And, just like that, IN EVERY WAVE (Guil Lefebvre's beautiful début translation of Charles Quimper's Marée montante, Éditions Alto) is off to the printer's.
"a multi-layered tale of unbearable sadness... impressive. ★★★★★” (James Fisher, The Miramichi Reader)
"simply one of the most touching books I have ever read" - Stuart John Allen, the translated-fiction blogger behind the #TranslationThurs hashtag, on Twitter
Out this October from QC Fiction!
April 5, 2017
"Je t'ai laissée derrière et depuis, chaque jour mon amour, c'est moi qui me noie."
"Comment une catastrophe comme la nôtre peut-elle ne pas affecter le cycle des marées, l'inclinaison de la Terre ou le cours de la Bourse?"
Lire marée montante est une expérience hautement physique, qui se ressent comme un grand coup dans le ventre. Une lecture qui laisse perplexe, désemparé et sans mot.
"Comment une catastrophe comme la nôtre peut-elle ne pas affecter le cycle des marées, l'inclinaison de la Terre ou le cours de la Bourse?"
Lire marée montante est une expérience hautement physique, qui se ressent comme un grand coup dans le ventre. Une lecture qui laisse perplexe, désemparé et sans mot.
did-not-finish
November 4, 2018Sadly, I didn’t feel in any visceral way the sadness at the heart of this novella. All I felt by the time I decided to bail on page 20 of the 78-page novella was frustration with the writing/translation; its imagistic, prose-poem sparseness, to this reader at least, devoid of any power.
January 5, 2025
Ce livre a la longueur d'une nouvelle mais est rempli d'émotions du début à la fin. Un récit où un père s'adresse à sa petite fille, après sa disparition, probablement emportée par le courant de la mer. Une métaphore entre le deuil et le naufrage.
January 6, 2017
Quel beau texte onirique.
January 4, 2022
Incroyablement déchirant et touchant. Une plume poetique et magnifique.
December 20, 2024
4,5 ⭐️
Cette lecture, qui mélange l'imaginaire, la poésie et le récit, m'a jetée par terre. Très difficile à lire parce que tellement prenant, mais c'est une lecture à faire.
Cette lecture, qui mélange l'imaginaire, la poésie et le récit, m'a jetée par terre. Très difficile à lire parce que tellement prenant, mais c'est une lecture à faire.
September 17, 2020
En l’espace de quelques secondes, les parents de Béatrice la quittent des yeux et elle disparaît dans les flots. Créant un vide immense dans le couple déjà amoché, l’absence de Béatrice plonge ses parents dans un profond deuil. S’improvisant marin, son père décide de quitter sa vie à bord d’un petit bateau pour partir à la recherche de sa fille. Il sonde toutes les eaux et s’accroche à ses souvenirs en attendant de retrouver son enfant.
.
Perdre son enfant doit être l’une des choses les plus horribles à vivre et l’auteur réussit avec brio à décrire l’état du père de Béatrice. Un peu fou, un peu désespéré, il cherche avec acharnement. Au travers ses souvenirs, on ressent l’ampleur de tout ce qu’il ressent. C’est un magnifique petit livre qui brasse le dedans!
.
Perdre son enfant doit être l’une des choses les plus horribles à vivre et l’auteur réussit avec brio à décrire l’état du père de Béatrice. Un peu fou, un peu désespéré, il cherche avec acharnement. Au travers ses souvenirs, on ressent l’ampleur de tout ce qu’il ressent. C’est un magnifique petit livre qui brasse le dedans!
December 5, 2019
A character study of a father going through the unimaginable: the disappearance of a child. Admittedly, I found this novella a little too abstract at times. But In Every Wave succeeds at painting a picture of the slow unraveling of a tormented mind. All the obsessive imagery of water was extremely well done. I was deeply unsettled when I realized where this story was heading. "I'll never take my eyes off you again" was not only the perfect final line, it filled me with such pain. Those last three pages were more of the agonizing emotion I was looking for. Overall: a good read.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews