Julie's Review: The Paris Hours

Author: Alex George
Series: None
Publication Date: May 5, 2020
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Pages: 266
Obtained: publisher via NetGalley
Genre:  Historical Fiction
Rating: 5/5
Bottom Line:
Grab, Just get it at the library, or Remove from your TBR list? Grab

Summary: One day in the City of Light. One night in search of lost time. Paris between the wars teems with artists, writers, and musicians, a glittering crucible of genius. But amidst the dazzling creativity of the city’s most famous citizens, four regular people are each searching for something they’ve lost. Camille was the maid of Marcel Proust, and she has a secret: when she was asked to burn her employer’s notebooks, she saved one for herself. Now she is desperate to find it before her betrayal is revealed. Souren, an Armenian refugee, performs puppet shows for children that are nothing like the fairy tales they expect. Lovesick artist Guillaume is down on his luck and running from a debt he cannot repay—but when Gertrude Stein walks into his studio, he wonders if this is the day everything could change. And Jean-Paul is a journalist who tells other people’s stories, because his own is too painful to tell. When the quartet’s paths finally cross in an unforgettable climax, each discovers if they will find what they are looking for. Told over the course of a single day in 1927, The Paris Hours takes four ordinary people whose stories, told together, are as extraordinary as the glorious city they inhabit. ~amazon.com



Review: Here's the thing about great writers, they don't spell it all out for you they make you put the puzzle pieces together yourself. Alex George is a great writer because in The Paris Hours he leads you down a path but then leaves it up to you to chose what you think it all implies.

We have 4 different stories at the beginning of the novel that are very separate from each other: Jean-Paul who seeks to tell other stories because he can't confront the pain of his own; Camille who is in search of a book that her old employer kept because she's fearful for what it will reveal; Souren who tells his story through his puppet shows and Guillaume who owes the wrong people money and is trying to scrape up the money by selling the only painting that is significant to him emotionally.

Each of their stories is about love, pain, loss and survival but in just very different experiences. Each of them showcases their decisions whether during war, during employment, during a love affair and during marriage. The story that impacted me the most was Souren's because his what he went through and saw during the war. That doesn't mean that each of the other stories isn't impactful because they most definitely are but his is the one that sticks with me the most weeks after reading the novel. 

I wasn't sure how all of these stories were going to intersect but Mr. George brings them all together in such a way that wasn't expected but was so beautiful, I couldn't imagine it ending any other way.

I have read all of Mr. George's other novel and he really never disappoints, except that he needs to write quicker. 😀 If you haven't read him, you must and any of his books will be wonderful.



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