The magnificent first novel of the young musician Gael Fay was nominated for almost all the prestigious French awards, including the Goncourt final, and received four awards at once, including the Goncourt Lyceum Prize. In the spirit of the films of Emir Kusturica, the book tells about the lost country of childhood, drowned in military madness. The ten-year-old hero of “A Small Country,” like Gael Faye himself, has a French father and a mother a refugee from Rwanda. They live in Burundi, in a prosperous quarter of the capital, the boy studies at a French school, reads a lot and has fun with friends on the street. He tries not to notice his parents' quarrels and does not understand why his beautiful mother is so afraid, begging her husband to urgently take the family to France. Meanwhile, civil war is brewing in the country, and a monstrous genocide is being prepared in neighboring Rwanda. This poignant and poetic novel has been translated into 30 languages.