The present study aims to examine the various trends and innovations found in francophone African novels, to analyse their emerging manners as well as their multiplication strategies. With both a diachronical and synchronical view, it takes a critical look at the form and language used in the novels, their relations with production places and authorities of legitimization such as literary journals and publishing houses. Thus, the paradigm of passage which is at the centre of the analysis is a whole that concurrently holds physical elements of the geographical passages (the authors’ journeys and the symbolic value of their experiences) and the intertextual elements of the passage of the imaginaries (readings and a variety of contacts with cultural surroundings growing in variety).