Memory Beneath the Waves

Yukiko, a Franco-Japanese photographer, lives in Tokyo.

After the earthquake and tsunami that devastated the country on March 11, 2011, she receives no news from her maternal grandmother, who lives in a small fishing village. Consumed by worry, she decides to go there.

For her, it marks the beginning of a journey through a devastated country, the discovery of certain family secrets, and the finding of love.

Who exactly was O Kanekichi, a famous geisha who entertained circles of Westerners in Yokohama in the 1860s? Despite the one hundred and fifty years separating them, the two women seem connected... And history repeats itself...

"Laurence Couquiaud has a real talent for describing nature, combining botanical precision and restrained lyricism."

Pierre-Michel Robert – La Vie - Femme Actuelle Prize 2016, Eliette Abécassis's favorite.

The opinion of Librairie du Grimoire Ancien

La Mémoire sous les vagues by Laurence Couquiaud is a delicate novel that subtly weaves together the threads of past and present, collective history and individual destinies. Winner of the Femme Actuelle Prize 2016 and a favorite of Eliette Abécassis, the author delivers a work imbued with poetry and gravity.

The novel unfolds a dual temporal narrative: that of Yukiko, a Franco-Japanese photographer searching for her grandmother after the 2011 tsunami, and that of O Kanekichi, a famous geisha from 1860s Yokohama. This mirroring structure progressively reveals family secrets and the mysterious resonances that link these two women across centuries.

As Pierre-Michel Robert points out in La Vie, Couquiaud possesses a rare talent for describing Japanese nature with botanical precision and restrained lyricism. Her writing evokes the sensitivity of haikus, capturing the fragile beauty of a devastated country and the resilience of its inhabitants. Published by Pocket, this novel deeply resonates with the themes of the Grimoire Ancien: ancestral memory, feminine transmission, and the belief in a form of cyclical destiny. A moving and illuminating read.

— La Librairie du Grimoire Ancien