‘La Promesse’ is out now !

It’s finally here !

Ten months of very intensive work went into this beautiful book.

The author Marie De Lattre and I have known each other for many years, having gone to graphic design school together. We loosely stayed in touch for twenty years, keeping track of what the other one was doing from afar.

The scriptwriter, Nicolas Buysse and Marie have known each other since childhood, so we came together as a team really easily.

Marie has written the story of her grandparents, eastern european jews who came to France in the 1920s and were deported to Auschwitz in 1942. Their son, Maries father, survived, hidden by friends and strangers alike.

We have all read stories about the Holocaust. They touch us, make us angry, leave us at a loss about how humanity and basic human kindness can be lost at such an extend.

But when we read a book we can close it and leave it for an hour or a day when it gets too hard to read.

The deadline was such that I had no such time to spare. I worked every day, litterally, for ten months. No day off, no Sundays, no holidays. And the story bled into my life in a way I had never expected. By August I burst into tears everywhere, at the supermarket, at the bakery… The characters of the book had become so real to me they seemed like family.

Fortunately this is also a story about hope and about unflinching love and kindness. It’s a story about those who survived and it’s a story that wants to remind us to look closely at what is happening in the world right now.

‘Never be a bystander’ says the Holocaust survivor Irene Butter.

And so it is with pride and hope that we present ‘La Promesse’ - hoping that it touches many as it has touched us and that it may contribute to our collective memory, so necessary to guide us on our path through the present.