The Mystery of Henri Pick/ David Foenkinos
The Mystery of Henri Pick is all the reading rage in France.
David Foenkinos
It is the story of a manuscript discovered in a library in Cruzon, Brittany, which has a section devoted to unpublished works by wannabe writers.
A young editress of the publishing house Grassset called Delphine sees her parents in Cruzon and visits the library with her writer boyfriend Frederic.
There they discover a manuscript supposedly written by Henri Pick who ran the local pizzeria with his wife Madeleine. Henri has now passed on as has the librarian Jean Pierre Gourvec.
The novel published by Grasset becomes an extraordinary success not least because of its unlikely origins. But is a hoax?
The subject is the last days of a love affaire. An alcoholic journalist on books called Rouche investigates.
The success of the novel does not bring much joy to the widow Madeline nor her daughter Josephine but they want to maximise the unlikeliness that their husband and father was a part-time writer in order to continue to receive the royalties.
Delphine becomes a high achiever in the publishing industry. It is an interesting account of how rackety that industry is.
The only problem in a good story told is the stance adopted by the author to the reader. He is a lot of know-all and this sentence is typical of many:
“Life has an inner dimension with stories that have no basis in reality but which are truly lived all the same.“
He see himself as literary connoisseur and critic too.
Nonetheless I found it an absorbing and engaging read and I can see why it became a best seller.
