Gathered, as every year, in a drawing-room of the Hotel Montalembert, we the six jurors * of the MC Prize, before speaking of books, wanted to speak of the price. To define, as always, the basis of this vote. What should we do? Choosing the most gay novel? The most realistic? The most original? And, in any case, were we to crown the text that we think would please our readers? But can we pretend to know in advance the choice you would make yourself? And is it not better to astonish you than to caress your readings in the direction of the hair? We finally decided to follow our instinct and our own judgment, hoping that you will share it. So we voted for the "best" book. The one, judged as the best, that is, the best written, the most surprising, the most moving. There was debate. Exciting and passionate. Then came the time to decide. The majority of the votes went to the author who had occupied half of our discussions and aroused the most passion: Claire Castillon.

His "Them" (ed. Of the Olive Tree) will not leave you indifferent either. You will also be scotched by the story of this young woman who does not want to have children, then who, pregnant, starts to hear voices ... Family voices that haunt her day and night for him give constant advice and orders on everything to do and not do when you expect a baby. At the same time, she tells us about her chaotic relationship with her mother, her beautiful love affair with the father of the future child and his long tumultuous sexual life . Skin sensitivity, black humor and linguistic inventiveness: explosive cocktail for wise readers.

Marianne Mairesse (assistant editor of MC), Léonora Miano (novelist, Fémina 2013), Juliette Joste (editor at Grasset), Nacéra Ben Mouhoub (librarian at La Plume vagabonde, Paris) and Gilles Chenaille (literary critic and creator of the site Rue des Auteurs).

Claire Castillon: "People often believe me bad"

They are all members of the narrator's family, close relatives or ancestors descended from the genealogical tree to rule her life as a pregnant woman and steal her future fortune because they are persuaded "they" will know well raise it! These tyrants, supposedly well-intentioned, but thinking only of filling the void of their own existence, the narrator calls them "hereditary". Like her, Claire Castillon was afraid that maternity would make her lose her freedom, that her individuality would be effaced to put herself at the exclusive service of a family lineage. But the author, now the mother of an 18-month-old daughter, has managed to overcome these obstacles. And this prize MC of the feminine novel comes to reinforce it in the serenity that it can now oppose to its inner volcanoes.

MC: Hello, Claire? We just get out of the vote and we wanted to tell you right away: you won.

Claire Castillon: That's great! And what a surprise: I was delighted to be in the final, but I did not think to win the prize at all. First because of the quality of competition. And then, I confess, I was persuaded that in the end the jury would find my book too much or too much ... excessive, what! I really thought you would vote for a less hard, less extreme novel.

About hardness, the cow humor you show in your books does not it cause you problems in life?

No, because in life I'm not cynical. I'm sweet. I do not swing pikes all the time. True, I speak the truth, rather than rain and fine weather, but those who know me are not afraid of me. I'm not naughty, as people often believe. In short: I am hypernormal, I do not shit.

You who are a mother now, are you not afraid of becoming a hereditary "hereditary" for your daughter?

No, I'm careful. I keep a firm eye on her safety, but apart from that, I refuse to force her to eat this, to do that ... Without bending to her four wills. I think of her in the future, hoping that when she is big and she will come to have a coffee with me, it will be because she will feel like it, not by obligation.

excerpts

"When I have phrases that come to block my head, I jump. Who speaks in me? "

"I live, at the age of 37, surrounded by a tribe. They may be invisible, but they talk to me all the time. Ever since I was pregnant they have been chatting to me. [...] I do not listen. I fall back in my own when the hereditary come to the ball. "

"Perhaps my mother might address me a few graces. I can no longer compensate each cowboy with a dick. [...] A dick by cowboy, I decreed that at 15 1/2 years, I repaired each reflection with a T'es belle, a J'te veux, un Pars pas. "

"I listen to my mother and my brain relaxes. I provoke myself a recreation, a vascular incident. I hear with my eyes, I answer with my nose. "