They read Proust, Hugo, Agatha Christie, and Prévert. They are between 75 and 90 years old—sometimes older. They read every day to escape, to stimulate their memory, and to break the monotony. And every year since 2020, they’ve selected the finalists for the Prix du Livre Nohée—a literary prize that, unlike so many others, originates with the readers rather than being imposed on them.
A literary prize born of a conviction
The Nohée Book Prize, worth 5,000 euros, is awarded annually to a novel or short story written in French that focuses on the transmission of knowledge and intergenerational bonds. It is organized by the Nohée Book Club, which operates in 39 senior living communities across France, in partnership with the Mollat bookstore. Over the course of six months, residents read, discuss, and evaluate the works based on defined criteria: emotional impact, originality, and quality of writing. This is not a literary fair award. It is an award given by serious readers.
The three finalists of the 7th edition—selected by residents prior to the deliberations of a jury chaired by actress Brigitte Fossey—embody this standard. Each title, in its own way, explores what connects us to those who came before us.
Three books, a single common thread
*They Called Him Bennie Diamond*, by Michaël Dichter (Les Léonides), is set in Antwerp’s diamond district of the 1970s. A coming-of-age novel about passing down a trade, the weight of one’s origins, and the promise of precious stones in a world governed by family legacies.
*Far from the Mekong*, by Louis Raymond (Calmann-Lévy), recounts a dual journey: that of a young Frenchman searching for his grandmother’s grave in the Mekong Delta, and, a century earlier, that of a young Vietnamese woman who crossed the same lands for entirely different reasons. Between the two lies a family history that generations have failed to pass down.
*L’enfant à la tête baissée* by Alexis Salatko (Denoël) is the most intimate of the three. A rare condition that makes it impossible to eat in front of others, a childhood marked by being different, and reading as a refuge—and later, as a home. A story that moved the book club’s readers more than any other, because it speaks to what books do when nothing else works.
What the Price Really Reveals
There is something profoundly unconventional about the Nohée Book Prize. In a publishing world where literary juries are often drawn from the same Parisian circles, where networking is sometimes worth more than prose, this prize comes from the grassroots: senior living communities, solitary Tuesday-morning readings, women who quote Prévert and Dumas from memory.
The winner will be announced in October 2026. Whoever it may be, they will have achieved something rare: the approval of readers who have nothing left to prove and who read solely for the love of reading.
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