The French author [a:Jean-Laurent Del Socorro|13596817|Jean-Laurent Del Socorro|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] has, since a few years, become one of my favourite authors, as you can see here (what I've so far by him). Before his debut novel, [b:Royaume de vent et de colères|25090639|Royaume de vent et de colères|Jean-Laurent Del Socorro|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1425723523s/25090639.jpg|44779717], was published, he mainly worked on short stories, one of which is this one here, 'La mère des mondes' (translated: Mother of Worlds). You can download it for free (after having created your Axys-account, which is very easy and useable on other, related websites) on the website of publisher Le Bélial. See here.

This short story here is more science-fictionish, in that it takes place in the (near) future and involving an "alien" species. The main character is a priest from Poland, who is devoted to spread the word of Christ around the globe. He travels to Zagreb, Croatia, to set up office there for about eight years. After that, once he's sort of fed up with being stationary, so to speak, he travels to New Zealand.

The way to travel there is through a "Bouche" or mouth. Some sort of portals, I'd say, which are heavily guarded until a certain time. Undertaking this mission, he ends up in a country that's heavily snowed under. Of course, he didn't know or foresee this, which means he could die soon enough when not finding proper shelter and food.

But then the "alien" population turns up and saves him from an untimely death. One thing leads to another, they exchange their own views about the world, about life, and mainly about the divine (gods, faith, belief). As you can imagine, there are differences in the approach (spirits vs one god), but there are also similarities in believing in general. During these talks, the "aliens" (a sort of centaurs) seem to be the more advanced population, indicating how limited the priest's view is. However, and that's where the title comes in, as the priest unravels his tale, he gets accepted by the group through a sort of ritual and even gets converted himself, as both "partners" wonder who Mary is (who has her counterpart in the "alien" belief), where she comes from, if she really exists. In other words: the priest went out to convert, but got converted by others.

'La mère des mondes' is a pretty good story, though there are some holes that I wished to see filled: what are these Bouches exactly? What's the world like in Europe? Why is the situation so much different in New Zealand? etc.). He could, if he wanted, expand this into a novel. The setup reminded me a bit of [b:Downward to the Earth|25509124|Downward to the Earth|Robert Silverberg|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1450533462s/25509124.jpg|953818] by [a:Robert Silverberg|4338|Robert Silverberg|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1366300348p2/4338.jpg], which I read earlier this year.

In any case, if you want a nice read in-between, then this short story is worth it. ( )