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Title — The Hammock and the Hummingbirds — My pen is my No
A book that wanted to live!
Author — Karine Baridon
Category — novel
Genre — comedy-drama
Style — self-deprecation, absurd humour, irony
Themes — resilience, creation, humour, transformation, freedom
Publisher — self-published
Publication — coming soon
ISBN — 979-10-989861-0-9 (paperback)
Pages — 498
Formats — paperback 15.2 × 22.9 cm · e-book · audiobook · free online reading, details on the Support page

Shelf — novel, comedy-drama, strongly metafictional and participatory.

Tags — comedy-drama · self-deprecation · resilience · creation · humour.

Shelf neighbours, as a rough guide — Daniel Pennac, for the tenderness and the way he talks to the reader. Nora Ephron, for the break-up turned into comedy. Helen Fielding, for the self-deprecating voice. Amélie Nothomb, for playing with her own image. Raphaëlle Giordano and Agnès Martin-Lugand, for the novel of rebuilding a life. And Gianni Rodari, for the book that invites you to create.

Readers — people who read to feel better, people who come from wellbeing, and people who create.

The novel factsheet fits on one page: the cover, the book at a glance (category, genre, style), the back cover, the author and the website’s QR code.

It all starts with a notification: “The Viking viewed your profile.”

In The Hammock and the Hummingbirds, Karine Baridon tells how a woman, instead of brooding, chose to create. She turned her anger into a character, her fears into laughter, her chaos into a novel.

The book dares a rare form. The author talks with her own character. Both are interviewed by a journalist on a TV show. The fourth wall falls, and the reader becomes a creator in turn.

Around the novel, the author runs a free, collaborative project. The novel is given away online, to read and to listen to. The website gives readers tools to create — games, exercises, creative challenges, practical guides — and a gallery to publish their creations, under their own name.

Every reader can take part: write, draw, compose, film. The project lives on this creative participation and on its readers’ support. Karine Baridon is available for interview.

“My pen is my No.” (ch. 47)

“Don’t read into my novel. Live your own.” (ch. 47)

“I’d rather laugh about it and be free than be right and cry over it.” (ch. 1)

“Healed, not bitter. I’ve forgiven. I’m free.” (ch. 1)

“Been there, laughed at it, living off it!” (ch. 45)

Just suggestions: the angle is yours.

Turning anger into creation: resilience through humour.
A new structure: the author talks with her character, under the eye of a journalist.
The reader invited to create: a novel given away online, and a gallery for their creations.
From art director to author: a creative career change.
“Healed, not bitter”: healing rather than getting even.
Self-publishing and a free website: a model where everything is a gift, and the printed book is for sale.

The novel is given away online, to read and to listen to. The author invites every reader to become a creator: write, draw, compose, film, starting from the novel.

The website gives creators tools to create — games, exercises, creative challenges, practical guides — and a gallery to publish their creations, under their own name.

Readers support the project with a solidarity subscription, a donation or by buying a book.

The website — lehamacetlescolibris.com
Read the novel online, for free — the Read page · the novel factsheet, with its QR code (PDF, in French)
The audiobook, read by the author (in French) — the podcast on Spotify · the YouTube channel
The novel’s songs — the YouTube playlist · the Spotify playlist of the songs · on Suno · on the website
The music mentioned in the novel — the Spotify playlist
Discover the novel’s world — characters, map of places, invented words, funny lines · the Hummingbird Kit, 35 practical guides
Create from the novel — create · share your creation · the gallery · the teaching kit
The TV series — the script, in French (PDF) · the script, in English (PDF)
Support the novel — buy the e-book or the book
Instagram — @lehamacetlescolibris
The press release — PDF, in French
The author’s portrait — image

The novel salutes the authors, artists and creators who inspired it: 249 creators, with their works and the chapters where they appear. Plenty to extend your reading and feed your mind.

The author, Karine Baridon, has written the pilot episode script for an adaptation of the novel as a TV series: 56 scenes in French, and the first part in English, with a view to offering it to producers and directors to bring it to the screen.

The project plans 47 episodes of 26 minutes, one per chapter of the novel.

Karine Baridon talks to print media, radio, television and podcasts, in person or by video call.

Where to meet her: the calendar of book fairs and book events.

By email: [email protected] · write to the author