The Harmattan Winds - by Sylvain Trudel (Paperback)

About the Book

"Hidden in the reeds floating on a pond next to the highway, a woman finds a baby bobbing in a shopping basket. Adopted by the Francoeurs, Hugues remains an outsider in his semi-family. At the same time, Habâekâe is adopted by a Canadian family and brought to Quebec after his own family dies of famine in Ethiopia. On the margins of their small town, the boys become sworn brothers, searching for their roots, desperate to return to exile, to a paradise called Ityopia"--Publisher's description.

Book Synopsis

"A fresh little novel, teeming with life, of uncommon strength." - Gilles Marcotte, L'actualité

An audacious and playful debut novel of adventure, brotherhood, and the search for a homeland -- a contemporary classic of Quebecois literature

Written with uncommon wit, The Harmattan Winds is a feast of wordplay, rife with puns and wonder - perfect for devotees of Ali Smith, classic adventure novels like The Adventures of Huckleberry, and John Knowles's A Separate Peace.

Hidden in the reeds floating on a pond next to the highway, a woman finds a baby bobbing in a shopping basket. Adopted by the Francoeurs, Hugues remains an outsider in his semi-family. At the same time, Habéké is adopted by a Canadian family and brought to Quebec after his own family dies of famine in Ethiopia. On the margins of their small town, the boys become sworn brothers, searching for their roots, desperate to return to exile, to a paradise called Ityopia.

Narrated by the bold and imaginative voice of Hugues, Sylvain Trudel's prize-winning debut novel is at times serious and at times fantastical. In their child's world, where Hugues and Habéké haven't yet learned the prejudices of adults, they embark on adventures, digging holes to China and building fantastical contraptions to take them to far off places, like their hero, explorer Roald Amundsen.

Review Quotes

"[In The Harmattan Winds] a series of law-and-life defying, tragi-comic capers echo Trudel's experience as a clown and writer of children's books . . . The Harmattan Winds waited thirty-nine years to be translated . . . publication now feels timely, as it explores the consequences of emotional alienation and intercultural ignorance. In a world facing a perfect storm of challenges, The Harmattan Winds reminds us that we have important choices to make." --Alice-Catherine Carls, Rain Taxi

"This tale is told in what may at first seem like a foreign language, probably because it is--one as foreign as anything utterly original, unconstrained by rules or logic. Nonetheless, if you allow it to pour over you, or into you, it soon becomes as lucid as if it were actually your native tongue, the one you understood (and may have been doomed to forget) before you were even born." --Doon Arbus

"Sylvain Trudel has peerless insight into a child's speech, imagination, and supple sense of wonder. With The Harmattan Winds, he has blessed us with the gift of childhood." --Stephen Sparks, Point Reyes Books

"The Harmattan Winds is a beguiling fairy tale of a book, indebted as much to Bellow's Henderson as it is to the immortal Peter Pan, a slender novel of the great adventure that is growing up." --Rumaan Alam

"The Harmattan Winds was a wonderful surprise. It's a lovely book and also a little fierce. Full of provocative ideas and adventures, and that one-of-a-kind voice of Hugues is a constant delight . . . So vivid, so quirky, so oddly believable . . . a very endearing book." --Robert Plunket

"An unusual coming-of-age tale imbued with undercurrents of magic, mystery, and tragedy . . . In the powerful novel The Harmattan Winds, young men struggle against their circumstances, seeking connections with and acceptance from others." --Ho Lin, Foreword, starred review

"Canadian author Trudel's debut novel, skillfully translated by Winkler . . adeptly interweaves intriguing African fables, provocative sociopolitical commentary, poetry, and armchair philosophy. This bildungsroman, underscored by a myriad of emotions, offers a portrait of two boys' desperate longing to feel at home in the world and their search for identity and a place where they can be free of adult intervention and societal pressures." --Lillian Dabney, Booklist

"Lyrical and enigmatic . . . Trudel sustains a dreamy mood and brings his characters to vivid life. [The Harmattan Winds] is a singular tale of trauma diverted into obsessive fantasy." -- Publishers Weekly

"With the spirit of a fairy tale, yet at the same time grounded in small town Quebec (or Canada generally) in an age before video games, computers or many available television channels, this novella surges with energy . . . The magic of this coming of age tale rests firmly on the imagination, determination, and entirely idiosyncratic worldview of Hugues and Habéké . . . Fast-paced and original." -- Joseph Schreiber Scofield, Rough Ghosts

About the Author

Sylvain Trudel is a French-Canadian writer of adult fiction and more than a dozen children's titles. He earned degrees in science and cinema and worked as a clown, a cucumber picker, and a commercial analyst, before turning to writing. His debut novel, Le Souffle de l'Harmattan (The Harmattan Winds), won both the Prix Molson and Prix Canada-Suisse. His work has been honored with the Prix Saint-Exupéry, Prix des libraires du Quebec, and Prix Christie, and in 2007 his novel Le Mer de la tranquilité won the Governor General's Prize. He lives in Quebec.

Donald Winkler is a documentary filmmaker and literary translator. He graduated from the University of Manitoba in 1961. He has translated over forty works from French, including novels, nonfiction, and poetry and has won the Governor General's Award for translation in 1994, 2011, and 2013. His translations include work by Pierre Nepveu, Samuel Archibald, and Kevin Lambert.