RENÉ BARJAVEL - Ashes, Ashes (English title)
NEW TIMES
"Your skyscrapers? They are much smaller!" LE CORBUSIER, architect
FRANCE     2052 A.D.
Except for a few places in the south and the capital , France is completely empty. Nature returns to the wild.
Paris has become an hectic megacity of 25 million inhabitants with rural flight.
The student François Deschamps left Provence, his country in southeastern of France, and moved to Paris...
...to find his lifelong girl friend, becoming a famous singer : Blanche Rouget.
CITIES COLLAPSE
"...and the cities of the Gentiles fell. And great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the indignation of his rath."                            THE APOCALYPSE OF ST. JOHN
The opening night Blanche's consecration on television, electricity suddenly disappeared for unknown reasons!
"...and suddenly, like a stone , darkness fell. The television , ceiling lights , all at once went out."
"The darkness drowned the city."
"Airplanes fall."
"And all cars are stopped."
"The sudden death of the engines went to the man and the Earth their respective dimensions."
Earth is turned off forever.
In this modern society, nothing works without electricity. Huge fires appear and can't be extinguished.
Paris, France, the World  are in flames.
In Paris, it reigns chaos and anarchy. The French government no longer exists. All pins are upset.
François Deschamps goes in search of Blanche Rouget...
...and he find her in alive near the television studios, in the 96th floor of the Ville-Radieuse Tower, the highest skyscraper in the city.
ASHES WAY
"I know he must be hot and there is the sea wind." RABELAIS
With other survivors, they leave Paris for their native village in Provence, hoping to rebuild everything.
They cross destroyed cities, landscapes covered with ash and cadavers concealed under cinders.
Will they fight gangs and hordes of savages?
Can they cross France and arrive to Provence?
