“Là où je vais” is a choral novel, that takes place at a high school in one-hour lapse of time and alternates the stories of four teenagers who do not know each other but who live at the same time a turning point in their lives. During that hour, they sometimes cross each other in the school hallways, but never talk together, they have other people on their minds and other problems to solve, while their classmates attend lessons: Leah becomes aware of her homosexuality, declares her love to Julie, a girl from her class, and is afraid of her reactions; during his theatre rehearsal Ilyes remembers his arrival to France from a far country a few years before, when he could not even speak French and sees how drama lessons have helped him in his integration process; Océane is destroyed by what happened to her at a party the previous night and cannot bear the weight of her secret; Clément, whose sister died a few months before, cannot find any zest for living. That day, in the time span of one school lesson, their lives will be transformed.
The high school that Fred Paronuzzi’s sensitive writing describes is a microcosm where the four characters personify the doubts and the worries that are typical of adolescence. Some troubles are serious, some other seem insurmountable. The novel highlights the importance of dialogue as a possible way to solve many problems that otherwise you cannot solve if you are alone. Mediation, mutual respect, acceptance of difference, trust in other people are the tools this novel gives young readers.