Quais du Polar and Italy
Project 2024-2025 : Franco-Italian 4-handed thriller
The Franco-Italian 4-handed Thriller project is part of a desire to strengthen the already existing link between Quais du Polar and Italy. The project to write this novel was initiated by the international festival Quais du Polar, in collaboration with the publishing house Points. An Italian publishing house is currently being sought to publish the novel across the Channel. The 4-handed thriller is supported by the Institut français / City and Metropolis of Lyon Convention.
This collaborative writing project of a noir novel, exquisite corpse where each author takes up the pen alternately for a new chapter, allows us to explore the societies, history and relations between the two countries, for a better mutual understanding. This year, French novelist Michèle Pedinielli and Italian author Valerio Varesi, accompanied by their respective translators, will be alternating their voices in a story set between Lyon and Milan.
A meeting is planned to honor the upcoming project during Polar Connection where the two authors and their publishers will present the book to the French public.
Quais du Polar in Iceland
Study trip to Reykjavik
In November 2024, the Quais du Polar team, accompanied by Morgan Audic (winner of the Quais du Polar / Le Figaro Readers’ Prize in 2024), set off on a literary journey to Reykjavik, a UNESCO City of Literature, just like the city of Lyon.
Iceland Noir
They were welcomed to Iceland Noir, a festival celebrating thrillers and crime fiction organised by bestselling authors Yrsa Sigurðardóttir, Ragnar Jónasson and Sverrir Norland. Numerous meetings were organised with authors from all over the world to engage in interesting discussions around the crime fiction genre. Morgan Audic took part in a meeting at Iceland Noir and another at the Alliance Française de Reykjavik hosted by Alexandre Labruffe, its director.
A journey full of encounters
The delegation had the opportunity to meet many of those involved in the book industry: publishers, booksellers, etc. A constructive meeting also took place with Kjartan Már Ómarsson in charge of Reyjavik City of Literature Unesco and Renaud Durville, cultural attaché at the French Embassy in Iceland. A meeting with the Finnish delegation provided an excellent opportunity to share experiences.
With the support of the Institut français / Ville de Lyon and Métropole de Lyon agreement. Thanks to the French Embassy in Iceland, Alliance Française de Reykjavik, Forlagid Rights Agency, Reykjavik Literary Agency, Iceland Literature Center, Bjartur publishing, Benedikt, Caroline Ripoll, Morgan Audic and the whole Iceland Noir team.
Quais du Polar and England
Project 2023-2024: Franco-British 4-handed thriller
The Franco-British 4-handed Thriller project is part of a desire to strengthen the already existing link between Quais du Polar and England. The project to write this novel was initiated by the international festival Quais du Polar, in collaboration with the publishing house Points. An English publishing house is currently being sought to publish the novel across the Channel. The 4-handed thriller is supported by the Institut français / City and Metropolis of Lyon Convention.
This collaborative writing project of a noir novel, exquisite corpse where each author takes up the pen alternately for a new chapter, allows us to explore the societies, history and relations between the two countries, for a better mutual understanding. The project, which began in the summer of 2023, was entrusted to Tim Willocks and Caryl Ferey, accompanied by their respective translators.
A meeting is planned to honor The Steve McQueen project during Polar Connection where the two authors and their publishers will present the book to the French public.
For more information on this work click HERE
Quais du Polar and Spain
Project 2022-2023: Franco-Spanish 4-hand thriller
The Franco-Spanish 4-handed Polar project is part of a desire to strengthen the already existing link between the cities of Lyon and Barcelona, as well as between Quais du Polar and Spain. The project to write this novel was initiated by the international festival Quais du Polar, in collaboration with the publishing houses Points and Alfaguara. It is supported by the Institut français / City and Metropolis of Lyon Convention.
This collaborative writing project of a noir novel, exquisite corpse where each author takes up the pen alternately for a new chapter, allows us to explore the societies, history and relations between the two countries, for a better mutual understanding. The project, which began in the summer of 2022, was entrusted to Rosa Montero and Olivier Truc, accompanied by their respective translators. It is published in Spanish by Alfaguara and in French by Points.
A meeting is planned to highlight the project L’Inconnue du Port during Polar Connection on Friday, March 31 where the two authors and their publishers will present the book to the French public.
For more information on this work, click HERE
Quais du Polar in India
Black in Mumbai
The Quais du Polar international festival was asked by the French Institute of India and the Alliance Française of Bombay to join the “NOIR IN MUMBAI” operation, a series of events such as meetings with French and Indian crime writers, a workshop, a screening and a Grande Enquête in the Kala Ghoda district of Mumbai.
This initiative was originally intended to be part of the Bonjour India festival, which was launched on the occasion of France’s invitation to the Delhi Book Fair in January 2022. “Noir in Mumbai” was remodeled and postponed to mid-November 2022. It is now taking place in the famous Mumbai Festival, Tata Lit Live ! which has integrated a detective theme.
Meetings, workshops, screenings
Three French authors have been invited to Mumbai to take part in meetings and workshops or to present a screening: Johana Gustawsson, Sophie Henaff and Jérôme Loubry.
An urban survey in central Mumbai
In Lyon, Quais du Polar has been organising a Grande Enquête urbaine every year since 2008 and offers, in this suspenseful journey, to discover the city in a different way through an original story, a tailor-made text combining the richness of the written word and the singularity of the places visited, while playing with the codes of detective literature. Participants follow an original path, throughout which they look for clues scattered in unusual places or in the lines of actors, in order to solve the investigation.
The urban survey in Mumbai is inspired by the Lyon experience. The design of the survey is conditioned by the locations chosen and the partners involved. The original idea and the writing of the text were entrusted to the Indian author Kalpana Swaminathan, accompanied by the team of Quais du Polar, the IFI and the Alliance française. The survey will take place in the Kala Ghoda district, the historic heart of the city and is committed to highlighting the links between the two cities. We meet the Lumière brothers, Edmond Locard and the famous Lyon Mothers.
For more information on this work, click HERE
Quais du Polar and Germany
Project 2021-2022: Franco-German 4-handed thriller
Christine Steiner, Commissioner for Anti-Terrorism, is sidelined after a major blunder during the hunt for a dangerous far-right activist. She left to take her mind off things in Lyon, where she discovered a kind of missing link in her own history. Was his abrupt departure for Leipzig, in search of a certain Wolfgang Sonne – a former member of Baader’s gang – motivated by personal or political reasons?
The Franco-German 4-handed Polar project is part of a desire to strengthen the already existing link between the cities of Lyon and Leipzig, as well as between Quais du Polar and Germany. Le projet est accompagné par the Quais du Polar team, by the French Institute of Leipzig and the Franco-German Citizens’ Fund.
This collaborative writing project of a noir novel, exquisite corpse where each author takes up the pen alternately for a new chapter, allows us to explore the societies, history and relations between the two countries, for better mutual understanding. The project, which began in the summer of 2021, has been entrusted to Max Annas and Jérôme Leroy, accompanied by their respective translators. It is published in German by Nautilus and in French by Points.
A meeting was dedicated to the Terminus Leizpig project during Polar Connection on Friday, April 1st where the two authors, their editors and translators were able to exchange and present the book to the French public. The novel had been presented to the German public a few weeks earlier, at the French Institute in Berlin and Leizpig.
2020 project: Krimi à la française
For the fourth year in a row, the Quais du Polar festival and the Institut français have jointly organised the Quais du Polar festival in Leipzig on the occasion of the de la ville, an event showcasing French-speaking authors of detective literature to the German public. This project took shape in March 2020 under the title “Krimi à la française”. It was also supported by the City of Lyon, the Metropolis of Lyon and the City of Leipzig.
More broadly, this operation was an opportunity to highlight French-speaking crime fiction authors in Germany with the distribution, prior to the event, to the press but especially to German publishers likely to publish them, of a selection of authors and works not yet translated in Germany, in partnership with the Book Bureau of the French Institute in Germany. The invitation of authors is made in close collaboration with their German publishers, on the basis, in particular, of their literary news in Germany.
Quais du Polar and South Korea
South Korea in Lyon
Quais du Polar and the Institut Français, in partnership with the Cultural Service of the Embassy of France, the Korean Publishers Association (KPA) and the Korean Literature Translation Institute (KLTI), are collaborating on the thriller for a round trip between Seoul and Lyon, with a view to building bridges between the black cultures of the two countries. Authors and publishers will be on the trip, spotted and accompanied by the Quais du Polar team.
In July 2021, in Lyon, Quais du Polar hosted a discovery focus on South Korea through three authors invited to converse online with the guests on site in Lyon: PARK Seo-Lyeon, SEO Mi-Ae, ZANG Min-Hye.
An online round table, led by journalist Philippe Manche, made it possible to discover Korean crime fiction in the company of five authors: Seo Mi-Ae, Kim Jay, Kim Un-Su, Zang Minhye and Park Seo-Lyeon.
A Cinema program also allowed the discovery of emblematic Korean films, presented by Korean authors.
Quais du Polar in Korea
From Wednesday 8 to Sunday 12 September 2021, on the occasion of the Focus Thriller at the Seoul International Book Fair, authors, and publishers français.es represented the different trends in crime fiction from France to the Land of the Morning Calm. Michel Bussi, Hannelore Cayre, Maxime Chattam, Bernard Minier, Michel Montheillet, Benoît Philippon, Olivier Truc, Bernard Werber, translated in South Korea, took on this mission! A professional meeting, around the “Trends in the French and Korean crime fiction markets” gave the floor to Pierre Bisiou, director of Matin Calme and Hélène Fischbach, director of the Quais du Polar festival, among others.
For more information on the program, click HERE
Quais du Polar and the France-Romania season
In 2019, the France-Romania cultural season was an opportunity for the Quais du Polar festival to contribute to the discovery of the literary and cinematographic riches of both in each of the two countries, in particular through crime fiction. Three projects aimed at readers and professionals have been carried out in collaboration with the National Museum of Romanian Literature in Bucharest and the French Institute of Romania.
Four-handed novel
A collaborative writing project between two young authors, one Romanian Lucian-Dragos Bogdan and the other French Jacky Schwartzmann, was initiated in the fall of 2018. The publisher Tritonic in Romania and the publisher La Fosse aux Ours in France (and more precisely in Lyon!) accompanied the authors in this project, defining with the partners the format and the themes. The authors, on the other hand, have chosen to start with a real news item and to write the chapters individually and successively. The Chest, their four-handed novel, was published in June 2019. Find the book in all good bookstores!
For more information on this work, click HERE
Discovery programming
During its 15th edition, the festival also programmed a “Discovery Focus”, inviting Romanian authors who spoke at conferences and film screenings. Several Romanian publishers were also invited to exchange with book and publishing professionals during the meetings Polar Connection. Enfin, Quais du Polar a accompagné la 1 the 1st edition of the festival dedicated to the crime genre “The Mysteries of Bucharest” from June 7 to 9, 2019, in partnership with the National Museum of Romanian Literature, the French Institute of Bucharest and the Romanian Playwrights Theatre. Visitors were able to enjoy a highlight around the invited French authors – Julie Ewa, Johana Gustawsson, Bernard Minier and Jean-Christophe Rufin – film noir screenings, shows, signing sessions, etc.
For more information on the program, click HERE
