Sophie Buchaillard – författare

"…succeeds in shedding fresh light on an atrocity that is far too little known in the West" - Buzz Magazine"Sophie Buchaillard''s novel is a stark and terrifying reminder that only the most fragile screen separates the familiar from the abyss, the comforts of home from the most obscene and extreme violence. It is an elegant and sombre reflection on what it means to retain one''s humanity in the face of a brutal and dehumanising cataclysm." – Richard GwynIris and Victoria are pen-pals. One day Victoria''s letters from Rwanda suddenly stop. In Paris, Iris can only wonder why. Through her father''s work she knows a terrible genocide has taken place. Still haunted by the loss of her penfriend, twenty years later Iris – now a journalist in London – pitches a story to her editor: she will try to find Victoria.

One family's story set against the backdrop of some of the biggest political and humanitarian events of the century. A tale of unravelling family secrets, belonging, betrayal and inherited trauma. A book that transports you in time and place through one family's history and struggle with its colonial roots. Marianne: a mother with a colourful past, keeping a terrible secret, tries her best to conform to French middle class expectations. Charlotte: young and fiercely independent, desperately needs to escape dreadful trauma and a country she does not feels she belongs to. She leaves France and arrives in Wales, hoping to find peace and somewhere to rebuild her life. This book explores the challenges of identity, belonging and womanhood, and the stories we tell in order to fit in.

Painting Over the Cracks is novelist Sophie Buchaillard’s poetry debut. Inspired by her life and a series of workshops she ran with survivors of abuse, this collection explores the relationship between unspoken shame and fraying family ties, and the healing power of expression, friendship, and community in overcoming trauma. Split into four chronological sections, the collection travels from the anxieties of a single mother to memories of buried traumas that lurk in corners of the mind, colouring every interaction to articulating the unspoken, strong from new friendships and rediscovered communities.