I initially liked the concept of a halfwit man in his 40's befriending an intellectual lady in her 80's, as it's not a dynamic that is overused in today's books, but I just found that this novel lacked substance. It had the shallow depth of a children's book, while being an adult book. Strange. ( )

"Ce qu'ils mettent au dos des romans, je vais vous dire, c'est à se demander si c'est vraiment écrit pour vous donner l'envie. En tout cas, c'est sûr, c'est pas fait pour les gens comme moi. Que des mots à coucher dehors - inéluctable, quête fertile, admirable concision, roman polyphonique...- et pas un seul bouquin où je trouve écrit simplement : c'est une histoire qui parle d'aventures ou d'amour - ou d'indiens. Et point barre, c'est tout."

Née en 1957, Marie-Sabine Roger se consacre entièrement à l'écriture. Son travail est très reconnu en édition jeunesse, où elle a publié une centaine de livres, souvent primés. Pour les adultes, elle a notamment écrit "Un simple viol" (Grasset, 2004), et des nouvelles publiées chez Thierry Magnier, "La théorie du chien perché" (2003) et "Les encombrants" (2007).

an awkward 45yo lunkhead (who's not really a lunkhead but has just been convinced of this over his lifetime) finds acceptance, friendship, and love with and 86yo woman. they meet and bond over their shared fascination with pigeons and go on to create their own grandmother-grandson relationship of choice.

this was a charming read, rough at moments - when learning about germain and his background - but this is smoothed out by the grace and kindness margueritte brings to his life. ('rough' in context with germain's personality and experiences.) family can often be a fraught landscape. it's nice to read about people who manage to carve their own spaces and find their people. ( )

“When I was a kid, my mother used to call me the happy halfwit. But it wasn't true. I wasn't happy. Halfwit, maybe. But happy, no way.”

Germain has always been told he is slow, soft in the head, and he has always believed that. He is crude and unloved and poorly educated, and pretty much accepts that is how it will always be. And then he meets an old lady, Margueritte, on a park bench.

Initially, I wasn't sure I'd like this book. Germain's first person telling of his story seemed a bit clunky, and as I said before, he was pretty crude.

It didn't take long for me to love him, and for me to love Margueritte, who gently taught him without making him feel soft in the head. I love that Germain shared his learning, his dictionary definitions, with the readers.

Germain's friends were not quite sure how to take the new Germain. If a person changes, is he still the friend you had before? Has he betrayed you by not sticking to the stereotype you gave him?

This is a charming book that I ended up loving.

I was given an advance e-book for review. The quote may have changed in the published edition. ( )

For whatever reason it took me like 8,000 years of being a book blogger before finally getting on the NetGalley bandwagon, but here I am, ridin’ that wagon!

My first book was Soft in the Head by Marie-Sabine Rogers, which has been translated from its original French and will be published in June of 2016.

Man, I need a friend to read this and tell me what I think about it. It’s a first-person narrative told from the perspective of Germaine, a man whose mother describes him as a “halfwit.” Certainly there is some non-neurotypical stuff going on with this guy but it’s hard to gauge how much of it is his low opinion of himself and how much of it is actual obstacles.

One thing we do know is that he’s a drunk and the drunks he hangs out with make fun of him constantly. He doesn’t realize that and it’s painful to watch. But then it’s not. Like, do I want the guy to be hurt by the comments of these assholes? Certainly not. But I do want him to just magically stop hanging out with jerks.

And he sort of does. The story is mostly about him meeting an older woman who, like Germaine, is obsessed with counting pigeons. Fun times!

Their friendship develops and they teach each other things and blah blah. Heartwarming and all that, sure. But most of this was painful to read and I was never really clear if the author was trying to show us how mean everyone was to Germaine or if she was being mean to him herself. Overall this book left me feeling uncomfortable and irritated at pretty much everyone in the book. ( )