Why a Booktrail?
2000s: Zenith Hotel is set in Paris but this is not the Paris you know and love – this is the Paris that is right there in front of your eyes but which you never see.
Zenith Hotel
What you need to know before your trail
This is the Paris that is right there in front of your eyes but which you never see. This is the Paris Nanou – a streetwalker- is about to introduce us to.
There are no introductions, no explanations of backstory; nothing. The reader is thrown into Nanou’s life and the effect is startling –
‘When I wake up, my teeth feel furry. There’s a foul taste in my mouth – a nasty sort of animal taste. Still, it’s better than at night, when I have the aftertaste of other people and their filth.’
Travel Guide
This is Nanou’s Paris.
She admits that she cannot start the day without a coffee and when she realises she has run out, she goes to Place Clichy to buy some, or if it is too expensive, goes to Rue Amsterdam.
Although this is Nanou’s story, it is also the story of her clients – and gives a stark and sometimes painful yet always truthful portrayal of each one. These people range from sad,lonely and dispossessed and often a mix of all three. Roger for example is likened to a sponge who absorbs the world around him yet sometimes he reaches saturation point and gets angry and frustrated at that world when he gets jostled on the metro and then –
…he spews out everything in a stream of insults and platitudes, an uncontrolled performance that spatters the toes of your shoes. But if he’s discreet, people don’t notice him.
By writing short sentences in brief chapters, the author structures the novel in such a way that the physical book is exactly what it portrays inside – a snapshot of the shabby heart of Parisian life.
Paris here is raw and it is unleashed like a wild animal caught in its underbelly where every is chewed up and spat out those who inhabit its shabby back streets. However there is tenderness and humanity to be found amongst the detritus. Humanity in all its forms.
Where Next?
