French writer Jean Rolin’s novel “Le traquet kurde” (“The Kurdish Wheatear”) has been awarded the Vialette literature prize. The Kurdish Wheatear is also in the running for the Livre Inter literature competition.

“Le traquet kurde” is a novel about ornithology, but it also focuses on the Middle East issue. The 176 page long novel hit the shelves this January, and received the Vialette, the literature prize foundd by La Montagne/Centre France group, this Thursday. The novel The Kurdish Wheatear is also in the running for the Livre Inter literature competition, whose winners will be announced on June 4.

The novel the Kurdish Wheatear starts in the Puy-de-Dome region of France. In spring 2015, a species of bird from Kurdistan appears in this central French region. The emergence of the bird happens some weeks after the battle of Kobanê, when the ISIS gangs were defeated by Kurdish forces and the city became a symbol of resistance for the whole world. Rolin ponders this bird, which in principle should not be seen in France, and takes the reader from France to Mosul, and to Daqar and Mauretania. In this sense, the novel is also a lesson in geopolitics, woven with light irony and great melancholy.

Jean Rolin follows the bird into Kurdistan. During this journey, at the summit of Mount Nemrut, a Kurdish wheatear lands by his feet.