Out of Sorts by Aurélie Valognes was one of the hottest titles in Amazon during the last month of 2015. The official English language premiere of the novel was set for January 1, but the book was selected to be part of Kindle First program and received huge positive feedback. With 230 plus reviews the fresh and funny story gathered an average evaluation of 4.2 Amazon stars. Out of Sorts finished on the third spot at our Top 10 Amazon bestsellers for December.

Our next guest was born in Paris, but now is living in Milan with her husband and 3-year-old son. Chapeau for her and for the success of her debuting novel. It’s a great pleasure to welcome at Land of Books the French bestselling author Aurélie Valognes.

– Aurélie, what is your book Out of Sorts about?
– First of all, I would like to thank you Ognian for your invitation in your blog! A real honor for me to be one of your guests.
I love to read books which are all about beautiful unexpected encounters, such as we would like to see happen a bit more in our daily life. This is what I tried to convey in Out of sorts, putting lights on a neighborhood (all protagonists live in the same building) in which extraordinary friendships between three ordinary life people would occur. Ferdinand, the protagonist, cantankerous old man, represents the man we could all become, alone and bitter, if we are not making today the needed efforts to demonstrate better our love to the people around us. Beatrice, 93, his door neighbor, is his complete opposite. She enjoys everyday as the last one and can’t help herself from learning new things and meeting new people every day. These two neighbors would never have a chance to talk to each other unless an expected encounter would revolutionize their life. New neighbor, Juliette, 10, fresh, positive and cheeky, literally invites herself at Ferdinand’s and establishes new relationships between the three of them, making the old man to open up not only his door but his heart too. Obviously, this generational shock brings lots of humoristic incongruous situations.
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