Descriptions, Reviews, etc.
Description:
ONE OF KIRKUS'S 20 BEST BOOKS OF JANUARY
ONE OF BOOK PAGE'S TOP 10 BOOKS OF THE MONTH
The "endlessly compelling" (
NYT Book Review) untold story of a trailblazing Paris correspondent for
The New Yorker, who sounded the alarm about the rise of fascism in Europe while becoming enmeshed in the sensational case of a German serial killer stalking the streets of the French capital on the eve of WWII.
In 1925, the Indianapolis-born Janet Flanner took an assignment to write a regular 'Letter from Paris' for a lighthearted humor magazine called
The New Yorker. She'd come to Paris to with dreams of writing about "Beauty with a Capital B." Her employer, self-consciously apolitical, sought only breezy reports on French art and culture. But as she woke to the frightening signs of rising extremism, economic turmoil, and widespread discontent in Europe, Flanner ignored her editor's directives, reinventing herself, her assignment, and
The New Yorker in the process.
While working tirelessly to alert American readers to the dangers of the Third Reich, Flanner became gripped by the disturbing crimes of a man who embodied all of the darkness she was being forced to confront. Eugen Weidmann, a German con-man and murderer, and the last man to be publicly executed in France--mere weeks before the outbreak of WWII. Flanner covered his crimes, capture, and highly politicized trial, seeing the case as a metaphor for understanding the tumultuous years through which she'd just passed and to prepare herself for the dangers to come.
The Typewriter and The Guillotine offers the personal and professional coming-of-age story of an indomitable journalist set against a glamorous, high-stakes backdrop--a tightly-coiled drama full of romance and intrigue.
Review Quotes: "A double whammy coming-of-age story: of Janet Flanner, an American journalist in Paris in the 1920s; of the New Yorker, a brand-new magazine, breezy, giddy, lightweight, and attempting to appeal to the man-about-town reader. Flanner soon finds herself jumping into the deep end, without knowing how deep it is (spoiler alert: as deep as it gets--the rise of fascism, the trial of a murderer); and she convinces the New Yorker to jump right along with her. A remarkable book, highly inventive and wildly original."--Lili Anolik, bestselling author of Didion & Babitz
