Jean-Michel Ghenassia is a writer who has rapidly gained popularity in recent years, author of the novels 'The Club of Incorrigible Optimists,' 'The Extraordinary Life of Ernesto Che,' 'Death and Cheat,' and others. French critics called his book 'The Club of Incorrigible Optimists' great, and French high school students awarded the author the Prix Goncourt. The novel's hero is twelve years old. This is Paris in the early sixties. And this is the notorious adolescence, when everything—school, communication with parents, and life in general—is difficult. Michel Marini is no different from his peers, except for his passion for photography and a selfless love of reading. He also has a secret hideout—the back room of a Parisian bistro. There, strange people who fled countries separated from the free world by the Iron Curtain argue, yearn, and play chess, waiting for their fate to be decided. Surprisingly, it is here, in this little room, nicknamed the Club of Incorrigible Optimists, that the power lines of the era intersect.