The Future by Catherine Leroux, translated by Susan Ouriou
CBC Books | Posted: August 23, 2023 4:40 AM | Last Updated: July 8
A novel about an alternate history Detroit
In an alternate history of Detroit, the Motor City was never surrendered to the US. Its residents deal with pollution, poverty, and the legacy of racism — and strange and magical things are happening: children rule over their own kingdom in the trees and burned houses regenerate themselves.
When Gloria arrives looking for answers and her missing granddaughters, at first she finds only a hungry mouse in the derelict home where her daughter was murdered. But the neighbours take pity on her and she turns to their resilience and impressive gardens for sustenance.
When a strange intuition sends Gloria into the woods of Parc Rouge, where the city's orphaned and abandoned children are rumored to have created their own society, she can't imagine the strength she will find. A richly imagined story of community and a plea for persistence in the face of our uncertain future, The Future is a lyrical testament to the power we hold to protect the people and places we love — together. (From Biblioasis)
- Heather O'Neill, championing The Future by Catherine Leroux, wins Canada Reads 2024
- Canada Reads winner The Future by Catherine Leroux among titles longlisted for $202K Carol Shields Prize
- The top 20 Canadian books of 2024, so far
- 8 Canadian books to read if you loved The Future by Catherine Leroux
- 'Disaster can actually herald change': Heather O'Neill discusses The Future's message of hope
- Author Heather O'Neill champions The Future by Catherine Leroux, translated by Susan Ouriou
- Catherine Leroux imagines an alternate history of Detroit in her book, The Future
- The best Canadian fiction of 2023
Catherine Leroux is a writer, translator and journalist from Montreal. She was shortlisted for the 2016 Scotiabank Giller Prize for The Party Wall, which is an English translation of her French-language short story collection Le mur mitoyen.
Susan Ouriou is a French and Spanish to English translator, a fiction writer and a playwright. She has previously won the Governor General's Literary Award for translation for her work.
How Catherine Leroux came up with The Future
"There's still a huge French community in that area, in southern Ontario, the area of Windsor and also in the Michigan area — so the French never left in reality — but my idea was that it never became American."
"And so basically in my world, Detroit or Fort Detroit is the second biggest francophone city in North America after Montreal. So that's the setting. I think that as soon as I started being interested in the history of Detroit, it went without saying that I would have to delve into that."
It was a nice way to rewrite history and rewrite the history of language at the same time. - Catherine Leroux
"And then it was also for novelistic reasons because I wanted to be able to write dialogue that felt closer to the dialects and the French that I hear around me. And if I'm writing about English characters, but I'm writing their dialogue into French, then it can't really take that shape. So it was a nice way to rewrite history and rewrite the history of language at the same time."