Sébastien Lapaque takes the Académie française's top fiction prize
The writer and Figaro critic won the Grand prix du Roman on a third ballot, ahead of Yannick Haenel and Marie Petitcuénot, for a novel his publisher is now reprinting in large numbers.
The Académie française awarded its Grand prix du Roman 2026 to Sébastien Lapaque for Le rappel des oiseaux (Actes Sud), according to Livres Hebdo. The decision came on a third round of voting, with Lapaque collecting eight votes against seven for Yannick Haenel and three for Marie Petitcuénot.
Actes Sud has announced a reprint of 30,000 copies of the novel, Livres Hebdo reports.
Lapaque, 55, is also a literary critic at Le Figaro, according to Télérama. He had already won the Renaudot prize for essay in 2024, for Échec et mat au paradis, Télérama notes.
Sources
This article was written from these reports.