Yesterday I started writing about my top 3 French-language books for intermediate learners. These books, and others, helped me improve massively and eventually get full marks in the reading comprehension part of the DELF B2 French exam.

Frère d'âme (lit. Soul Brother) - David Diop

Diop's second novel was short-listed for 4 French literary awards in 2018. The English translation (entitled "At Night All Blood Is Black") won the International Booker Prize last year.

What's it about?

A Senegalese Tirailleur (infantryman), Alfa Ndiaye, describes his experiences fighting with the French in the first world war. He is traumatised following the death of his fellow fighter and childhood friend, Mademba Diop. He returns again and again to the night of Mademba's death, not just in his thoughts, but in macabre re-enactments in no man's land.

Why read it?

• Despite all of the attention by high-brow literary awards, the language is extremely accessible, even for intermediate learners.

• There is a relatively small amount of new vocabulary to pick up. In fact, perhaps to echo the way the main character goes over and over the same painful events, a lot of phrases and words are often repeated. On the other hand, there is a chunk of war-related terminology that (hopefully) won't be too useful in everyday conversation. It's fairly tricky to get "trench", "explosive shell", or "disemboweled" into an average language exchange conversation, and not always appreciated.

• It's only 144 pages long. Even if you are at the stage where you're looking up a couple of words every paragraph, you can finish this in a month by just reading 5 pages a day.

• Once you've read it, there is an audio book available for listening practice.

Enjoy 📚🤓