From the author of Photo Upon Request, winner of the 2025 Goncourt Prize for a First Novel.
To become a model, there are application forms on agency websites. You have to send three photos. You're asked to provide your height, weight, and eye color. A response is promised within a few weeks to two months. Léo is represented by one of these photos. He explains to Simon that to be chosen, you need the right pictures, the right look, the right walk. That there's no other way than to learn how to present yourself well. Simon Chevrier's second book chronicles a year spent attending fashion house castings. Through the waiting and often dashed hopes, he reveals the implacable gaze of a teenager on himself, his body, and the bodies of other boys. A coming-of-age autofiction novel carried by masterful writing and immense sensitivity.
"Simon Chevrier speaks of constantly shattered expectations, dissecting his obsession with Léo, whom he met online, and his daily life with his mother, who also struggles to exist. Bonne figure is a successful parade of failed dreams." Les Inrocks
"The novelist examines the inner workings of the modeling world while exploring, with great precision, questions of masculinity and love. Between expectations, rejections, and constant availability, he reveals a world where the gaze of others shapes trajectories as much as identities. The style is direct, the text stripped to the bone. But through Simon Chevrier's words, a whole world unfolds. No psychology, no judgment. The novelist observes and tells it like it is." Harper's Bazaar
"A delicate and melancholic group portrait of boys still searching for themselves, even though a certain ideal has already been defined for them." L'Obs
Shortlisted PRIX BLU JEAN-MARC ROBERTS 2026
Shorlisted PRIX CASTEL 2026
Shortlisted PRIX MEDICIS 2026
