«Night in the Heart,» a voice for three silences

By weaving her own experiences of violence and survival into the stories of Emma and Chahinez Daoud, Nathacha Appanah tells the story of three women trapped in an abusive relationship, two of whom were unable to escape it.

In Night in the Heart, Nathacha Appanah weaves together the fates of three women: her cousin Emma, Chahinez Daoud, and herself. What they have in common is a frantic race to escape the clutches of their partners. The author will be the only one to succeed. Years after leaving that relationship, she decides to trace the paths of these women to bring their respective stories to life.

Three different stories, yet all centered on the same question: What remains after violence? What becomes of us when love is turned against us? The book doesn’t just recount personal tragedies; it reveals how certain forms of violence take root, are silenced, and then continue to exist long after the events have passed.

Charm Before the Trap

For all three women, their encounter with the man who would become their tormentor begins under seemingly ideal circumstances. He represents a place of freedom, of emancipation, but above all, of love. Violence does not immediately emerge as a threat. It creeps into a story that, at first, seems to hold promise.

The portrait of HC, the man who shared Nathacha Appanah’s life during those years of suffering, begins in this captivating way. A man of great literary erudition, he introduces her to the beauty of words and the energy of passion, presenting their story as an inevitable romance, an almost magical encounter. This love story, however, omits what, in retrospect, becomes central: the considerable age gap—she was 17 when they met and he was 32 years her senior—as well as the intellectual, emotional, and symbolic influence he exerted over her.

This is where the book subtly examines the most insidious forms of control. Sometimes, the trap is set through charm and the feeling of being chosen. Passion, as described by the one who dominates, can become a smokescreen masking the inequality and violence that gradually take hold.

Telling Others' Stories to Better Reveal Ourselves

The narrative shifts between these three women are not always explicit, as if to convey a shared voice. Of the three women, the narrator is the sole survivor of a dangerous partner. The power of her writing lies in her ability to move from one story to another, as if each woman’s fate shed light on the other two. She openly poses the questions the reader is asking, while questioning the very possibility of survival: her own, but also that of two women whom fate—or perhaps just a few circumstances—might have spared.

By deciding to investigate the final hours of the other victims, Nathacha Appanah also reflects on her own last days before her final departure. And as she retraces the years that gradually led Emma and Chahinez to their murders, she searches for the tipping point: the moment when escape is no longer possible.

Une question revient régulièrement dans les débats publics interrogeant la véracité des témoignages de victimes: pourquoi attendre des dizaines d’années pour en parler? Ce livre offre, à lui seul, plusieurs possibilités de réponse. Il propose une réflexion poignante sur la difficulté pour une victime de se considérer comme telle, sur l’impossibilité de creuser dans la douleur des souvenirs, mais aussi sur la force parfois puisée dans le malheur d’autres victimes, qui réveille la nécessité de s’exprimer.

«Memory is a choice; memory is a patient ghost. In the months that followed, I thought about Emma, I thought about her horrible death […], but I touched her memory only with the utmost care, as one might gently pry open a box of memories, and I closed it again very quickly, my hands trembling. I didn’t want to go back there. There: that hole that has become both a well from which I come to drink and an abyss into which I don’t want to fall.»

A travers son témoignage, Nathacha Appanah interroge moins la violence elle-même que ce qui lui survit. Il ne s’agit pas seulement de décider de raconter, il faut que cela devienne possible. Le poids des années n’efface pas la violence, mais rend parfois seulement la parole envisageable.

The Will to Live

Death looms over the entire story. Yet what interests Nathacha Appanah most is not so much death itself as the will to live that still drives people to flee, to resist, and to live.

«Je suis ici, allongée, les yeux ouverts, et aussi une autre qui se tient à côté, un ersatz de moi-même fait de morceaux de cette nuit que j’ai découpés et avalés. Aucune version n’est intacte. Les deux portent la honte, le chagrin, le sentiment de déchéance, l’envie de vivre. Vivre, oui. Encore. Comment est-ce possible, cette folie d’avoir envie de continuer à vivre encore des jours et des nuits ?» Nathacha Appanah dit ce paradoxe central: la violence peut briser sans éteindre tout désir de continuer. Vivre, ici, n’a rien d’un triomphe. C’est une folie presque incompréhensible, une impulsion fragile, mais persistante.

Is redemption still possible, despite everything?

En évoquant son histoire, Nathacha Appanah raconte aussi l’après: ce qui commence lorsque l’on parvient à quitter la violence. Le livre interroge cette culpabilité diffuse qui accompagne parfois la survie. Elle met des mots sur ce qui, longtemps, est resté à distance, non pour s’en libérer complètement, mais pour cesser peut-être d’être seule avec cette histoire.

A la fin du livre, les mots ne guérissent pas tout. Ils donnent une forme à la douleur, lui ajoutent peut-être des témoins, mais ne la font pas disparaître. En racontant Emma et Chahinez, Nathacha Appanah les arrache au silence, sans soulager tout à fait leur destin ni sa propre peine. Le livre ne transforme donc pas la parole en réparation totale. Il laisse plutôt une idée plus inconfortable: celle d’une vie sauvée, mais pas rendue intacte, une vie qui continue avec ce que la violence lui a définitivement pris.

Host of a poetry account on Instagram, Aurelia Fellous is a writer for the French cultural media Zone critique.

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Nathacha Appanah
Night in the Heart
Gallimard
August 2025
288 pages

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