Franco-Rwandan author Beata Umubyeyi Mairesse’s novel, ‘Tous tes enfants dispersés,’ has been selected as the best book in the recently concluded 2020 Five Continents Prize of La Francophonie. The prize, accompanied with 5,000 euros, will be handed over to the author at the headquarters of the International Organization of La Francophonie, in Paris, next month. Created by the OIF in 2001, the Five Continents Prize gives room to literary talents that reflect on the expression of cultural and editorial diversity in the French language on the five continents and seeks to promote their works on the international scene. Dubbed “Tous tes enfants dispersés”, translated as “All your scattered children”, Mairesse’s novel was published by Editions Autrement. It tells the story of a reunion between an elderly mother and her daughter who survived the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. The novelist depicts the relationships within a family broken by the genocide. The book also carries the voices of three generations trying to renew broken links and find their place in the world of post-genocide. In the book, one character Blanche, a Rwandan, lives in Bordeaux after having escaped the Genocide against the Tutsi in 1994. She built her life in France, with her husband and her mixed-race child Stokely. After years of exile, when Blanche visits her mother Immaculata in Rwanda, the memory painfully resurfaces. Meanwhile, Stokely, caught between two countries; Rwanda and France, wants to understand his origin. In an interview with TV5 Monde, Umubyeyi noted that the award will ensure exposure to the content in the novel. “It is a grand prize, considering that it covers five continents and promotes diversity. I believe that this book will be a window opened for the world full of readers, to help them enter an intimate history between Rwanda and France,” she said. Beata Umubyeyi Mairesse, 42, was born and raised in the now Huye district. A survivor of the Tutsi genocide in Rwanda in 1994. In July, she fled to France in search of refuge. She is a poet, short story writer, and novelist. “All your scattered children” was her first novel.
