The Moving Story of a Girl With a Shotgun in the Mouth

Denis Faïck

Amélie Poulain on valium.

30 years-old Josiane Camboulivesse works as a cleaner in the toilets of the Gare du Nord, the biggest and creepiest train station in Paris. This is not exactly the life she has been dreaming of but this how she managed to escape her small hometown, her mother she adores who has never loved her and her father who has never been there for her. For that matter, Josiane has always felt inappropriate and rejected by others. And she can't deal with it anymore.
But like in the 50's old movies she loves, her whole life passes before her eyes and especially her decisive and incandescent encounters: Martin, her first kiss who was suffering from tuberculosis
Germain, her parents' elderly and lonely lodger
Clara from her high-school years whose head was a mess
Franck, the thoughtful soldier
Anna, her first, pure, genuine, outstanding, deep love and Hyppolite, her flamboyant Ivorian gay friend.
For this few people at least, she has been worthy of interest and these guardian angels -or the memory of them-won't let her go so easily!

- Josiane is a glorified anti heroine whom you will feel for.
- A deep reflection on self-esteem and otherness. The author's career history and especially his philosophical approach make this novel an excellent basis for thinking about what makes oneself unique and thus eminently worthwhile.

Denis Faïck is a philosophy teacher at the university in Toulouse, but also for aerospace engineering students and for people in vocational
rehabilitation. He is also a yoga teacher and the author of several selfhelp books. La belle histoire d'une jeune femme qui avait le canon d'un fusil dans la bouche is his first novel.