The story describes how Quéré's idealistic political activism threatens his small business as he loses custom by pushing against ingrained conservatism.

Palante's despair inspired Guilloux to create the character of Cripure, the anguished anti-hero of Le Sang Noir (1935), which is considered his masterpiece.

His masterpiece Le Sang Noir was notable for its departure from his earlier, more straightforwardly socialist literature, since it contains elements of what was later associated with an existentialist or absurdist vision.

It centres on the suicidal thoughts of the anti-hero, Cripure, who feels overwhelming disgust at humanity in the destructive circumstances of militarism during World War I.

Le Pain des Rêves (Bread of Dreams), which he wrote during the Occupation, won the Prix du roman populiste in 1942.

Micro- and macro-history collide: the horrors of war, and anarchist and Popular Front politics or right-wing coups, impinge violently on private dramas.

"[7] Guilloux was also a translator of a number of books, including the novel Home to Harlem written by black American author Claude McKay, published in 1932 under the title Ghetto Noir.

In 1927, he signed the petition, published on 15 April in the magazine Europe, against the law on the general organization of the nation for war, objecting to the restrictions on intellectual independence and freedom of opinion.

The prize is granted each year to a work in the French language which is characterised by "the humane qualities of generous thought, refusing all dualism and all sacrifice of individuality in favour of ideological abstractions".