The Incorrigible Optimists Club (Klub neispravimykh optimistov)

Jean-Michel Guenassia is a new name in European prose, the author of the novels "The Incorrigible Optimists Club," "The Amazing Life of Ernesto Che," and "Deceive-Death." French critics have called his book great, and French high school students awarded the author the Goncourt Prize.
The hero of the novel is twelve years old. The time is Paris in the early sixties. And this is the notorious transitional age when everything—school, communication with parents, and life in general—becomes difficult. Michel Marini is no different from his peers, except for his passion for photography and his selfless love for reading. He also has a secret refuge—this is the back room of a Parisian bistro. There, strange people, who have fled from countries separated from the free world by the Iron Curtain, argue, yearn, and play chess while waiting for their fate to be decided. Surprisingly, it is here, in this little room, nicknamed the Club of Irremediable Optimists, that the power lines of the era intersect.