Mar 19th 2014, 16:29

A short novel that punches way above it's weight, Zenith Hotel is a worthy winner of the Prix de Flore. It seems that the UK market is getting a ridiculous number of quite brilliant French novels lately. This is no exception. A deeply bleak portrayal of a day in the life of Nanou seen through both her own eyes and through the live of the losers who are her clients. Nanou is a prostitute, nothing fancy, not a tart with a heart; simply a common streetwalker. She lives alone and, despite hating her life, she cannot feel anything but contempt for the ordinary 9-5 lives of 'normal' people. This is rather a depressing read, and about as bleak as it could get, but well worth a read if you want to experience a bit of Parisian grit.

Mar 19th 2014, 15:27

Recently I was lucky enough to be featured on the back cover of Arcadia's brand spanking new release Zenith Hotel. They sent me the mini-novel with the task of writing an 140 character review for twitter - I felt so modern. And now my quote is on the back of the book itself (which is published today), so exciting! So I thought it was time to write a proper review to truly honour this snapshot of literary brilliance

In my tweet review I called the story 'raw and unashamedly honest'. It follows the days of Nanou, a French street prostitute, her perspective is disjointed by the stories of her various (and very varying) clients. There is no sensationalising or glamorising in this novel, it is as purely frank as I could imagine an account of this way of life could be. What especially struck me was the base, simZenith Hotel completely avoids this trap and Coop-Phane handles such a dark theme through making it the backdrop for the stories, but not letting it dictate the entire novel. Instead, he uses the prostitution to blacken the tone of each story and exploit the desperation and isolation of the characters' lives.
plistic details of each of Nanou's clients' lives that Coop-Phane tells us. The mundanity, instead of making the stories tedious and boring, increases the candid realism of the novel. Nothing is left out, and similarly nothing is unnecessarily added in. So many novels concerning abuse or prostitution are saturated in an over-exaggeration of sexual language and images, and disturbing details, I find they take away from the story and characters in their quest to shock the reader.

Inspired by this overarching quality in the book, I called it a 'flash of the unity of loneliness within the crowd of humanity' - this came out of the way the characters were so contrasting - from ex-con to caretaker to frustrated husband - and yet all linked through the extreme loneliness that drives them to Nanou. Her service becomes less sexual and more emotional - if only for a few minutes. Through this, the choice of each character becomes random, they are each a chance cross-section of humanity, through their own detachment from it they convey it in all its terrifying immensity.

In my opinion, a review of a somewhat minimalist book should itself be no more than minimal. Coop-Phane leaves the book open to the reader, not to judge, but not interpret, and I can guarantee you will be interpreting it over and over again for days after you've finished it.