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The Paris Architect: A Novel, by Charles Belfoure
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"A beautiful and elegant account of an ordinary man's unexpected and reluctant descent into heroism during the second world war." --Malcolm Gladwell
A thrilling debut novel of World War II Paris, from an author who's been called "an up and coming Ken Follett." (Booklist)
In 1942 Paris, gifted architect Lucien Bernard accepts a commission that will bring him a great deal of money - and maybe get him killed. But if he's clever enough, he'll avoid any trouble. All he has to do is design a secret hiding place for a wealthy Jewish man, a space so invisible that even the most determined German officer won't find it. He sorely needs the money, and outwitting the Nazis who have occupied his beloved city is a challenge he can't resist.
But when one of his hiding spaces fails horribly, and the problem of where to hide a Jew becomes terribly personal, Lucien can no longer ignore what's at stake. The Paris Architect asks us to consider what we owe each other, and just how far we'll go to make things right.
Written by an architect whose knowledge imbues every page, this story becomes more gripping with every soul hidden and every life saved.
- Sales Rank: #4230 in Books
- Brand: Belfoure, Charles
- Published on: 2014-07-15
- Released on: 2014-07-15
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.23" h x 1.02" w x 5.84" l, .75 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 400 pages
From Publishers Weekly
How far would you go to help a stranger? What would you risk? Would you trade your life for another's in the name of what is right? Belfoure explores these questions and others in this debut novel set in Paris during the Nazi occupation. Lucien Bernard—who, like the book's author, is an architect—is offered a large sum of money to outsmart the Gestapo by devising unique hiding places for Jews, though he knows that anyone caught helping them will be tortured and killed by the Germans. Danger is everywhere: Lucien's mistress, Adele, a successful fashion designer, has an affair with a Gestapo colonel. Lucien's new assistant will betray him in a heartbeat. Offered a juicy German factory commission that involves working with a Nazi officer who admires architecture and art, Lucien's web weaves more complexly. And when he falls in love with Adele's assistant, rescues a child, and contacts some of the individuals he's saved, the stakes grow higher and Lucien's thoughts turn from money to vengeance. Seamlessly integrated architectural details add to the excitement. Belfoure's characters are well-rounded and intricate. Heart, reluctant heroism, and art blend together in this spine-chilling page-turner. Agent: Susan Ginsburg, Writers House. (Oct.)
From Booklist
Belfoure’s suspenseful and commercially oriented debut, set in 1942 Paris, follows a self-centered, ambitious man as he develops a moral conscience. When a rich businessman persuades architect Lucien Bernard to adapt an apartment to create a hiding place for a wealthy Jew, he takes it as a challenge. Despite the dangers, Lucien likes fooling the occupying Germans, the money is excellent, and it comes with a lucrative opportunity to design a new factory for the Reich. Tensions rise as he gets drawn deeply into the plans of both the occupiers and the Resistance. After one careless mistake results in tragedy, however, he begins reevaluating his life. The plot doesn’t skimp on evoking the constant fear the Parisians face or the brutality the Jews encounter. Food is scarce, black market goods are costly, and neighbors rat one another out to save their own necks. With his unadorned, zippy style and broad-brush characters, Belfoure writes like an up-and-coming Ken Follett but with more sex and violence and stronger language. There’s plenty of detail to interest architecture buffs, too. --Sarah Johnson
Review
"By combining his architectural background with his knowledge of Parisian culture and history, Belfoure tells an intriguing story about the people who risked their lives to save individuals who often had nothing to give in return except their gratitude." - Deseret News
Most helpful customer reviews
35 of 35 people found the following review helpful.
Plot B-minus, characters and dialog D
By Maine Colonial
After five short chapters, I made notes of what I thought would happen in this book and, no surprise, I was correct. In the author's Q&A at the end of the book, Belfoure describes his novel-writing process as being similar to an architectural project. He first devised the plot, and then he populated it. I suspected as much.
The plot certainly keeps the reader turning the pages but, at least in my case, I was turning them more and more quickly because I wanted to be done with the book. The problem was that although Belfoure's structure--the plot--was sound, albeit predictable, his characterization and dialog were seriously flawed.
It was a good idea of Belfoure's to have the protagonist, Lucien Bernard, be a man with no sympathy for the plight of France's Jews, but who was drawn into saving Jews--first, through ambition, but then from conviction. Beyond that, though, the characters were flat, stock characters, and/or devices to help move along the plot. Sometimes they were inconsistent and changing in a moment, just to serve the plot.
For example, Belfoure apparently felt that Bernard, being a Frenchman from Paris, must have a wife and a mistress, so he did, even though the wife, Celeste, was an almost entirely undeveloped character and could easily have been eliminated from the novel. The mistress, Adele, seemed to be there only to help illustrate the stock character of the "horizontal collaborator," help the reader to get to know the depths of Nazi evil, and put Bernard in dangerous situations with the Nazis.
The dialog was wooden, and characters used slang and vernacular that wasn't appropriate to the time or place. It was disconcerting to read Bernard's memory of a clerk who regularly came back from lunch "[excrement]faced," another character saying "hey, [excrement]head" to an office boy, an old man calling Bernard "mother[youknowwhat]er." Of course, the French of the 1940s had their own low-down slang, but these terms just didn't translate as being equivalents. They sounded way too modern and American.
Then there is a scene that made me laugh out loud when a character says to Bernard: "with men like you in the fight, I'm sure we'll win." It was almost a straight copy of a scene in the movie Casablanca. Then there was the strangeness of references to characters having a "heeb look." The pejorative term, which is what these characters intended, is spelled h ... e ... b ... e. (Modern slang appropriates "heeb," but not as a pejorative.) A spellcheck program would have highlighted this mistake, so I'm not sure why it wasn't corrected. This would be a mistake not worth mentioning in a stronger novel, but when it's one of several other clunkers in word use, it's harder to overlook.
I read a lot of World War II history and fiction, and I agree with historian Max Hastings' description of that war as the greatest and most terrible event in human history. I think it's extremely challenging for a first-time author of fiction to dive into such difficult waters. In this case, I think the challenge was a bit too much for Belfoure's current skills with character development and dialog.
My three-star rating is a compromise between my decent grade for the plot and near-failing grade for the characters and dialog. I would have given it 2.5 stars if Amazon's system permitted.
342 of 388 people found the following review helpful.
I hate myself for finishing this book...
By Petsounds
...and not stopping a third of the way through it, at which point the graceless, clumsy writing and two-dimensional characters were wearing on me. But the two stars are for Charles Belfoure's ability to plot. The book is a page-turner, no doubt about it. Once I had started reading, I had to find out how it ended. That doesn't mean that I found the ending--particularly the main character's revelation about his own motives--believable. I didn't.
But beyond the plot, there is nothing here. The characters are cardboard cutouts--especially, but not solely, the women. You have your gorgeous, ambitious slut who will do anything to save her business; your gorgeous former slut with a heart of gold, whose entrance into a factory causes every single one of the 200+ men who work there to stop working simultaneously (Come on...); the brilliant microbiologist for whom "being a mother would always trump her career;" and assorted slatterns and ugly charwomen. You have your good Nazi and your typical Gestapo guy who laughs helplessly as a man is brutally tortured in front of him. The writing is sloppy and reflects the now common lack of editing and proofreading that infects virtually all books; in one paragraph, "Lucien, the atheist didn't want any religious horse s***," and in the very next paragraph, he thinks, "His father was probably looking up at him from Hell." And wouldn't you think that an architect would know that the thing over a fireplace is a mantel, not a mantle?
At one point, Lucien, the main character and the Paris architect, suddenly longs to become a father. Out of the blue. With no background to support what becomes a major factor in the plot and that rings as false as a cracked bell.
Mr. Belfoure, an architect himself, is the subject of one of those author interviews at the back of the book, and he describes his reason for wanting to write this book this way: "Once I had some nonfiction experience under my belt, I thought I'd try fiction." Kind of like my saying, "Once I'd learned to drive a car, I thought I'd try the Indy 500." There's more to good writing than getting some newspaper articles under your belt. One of them should be voracious reading, but when asked who his favorite fiction writers are, he can name only one--Anne Tyler, because both she and Belfoure are from Baltimore.
If you want to read a beautifully written and realized novel about Paris during the Nazi occupation, read Alan Furst's beautiful The World at Night. One reviewer inexplicably compared Belfoure to Furst, a slap in the face to an actual writer, someone who has practiced and learned how to take the turns at 200 mph. Mr. Belfoure is still in the scooter stage.
103 of 117 people found the following review helpful.
One of the best I've read this year...
By Barbara McArthur
For a debut novel, this one had all the bases covered - well-defined characters, settings that transported, and a plot that got a grip on me and moved me quickly along. This was a book I did not want to put down. The era of the German occupation of France during World War II has always been interesting, but, in the Paris Architect, we were made to live with the Parisians and to see and feel, on a daily basis what life was really like. The temptation to work with the Germans to make money which would buy food - the fears that caused neighbor to turn on neighbor in order to save one's own skin - and the terror of watching the persecution of the Jews - men, women, and the children. The cruelty of the Gestapo, the relentless pursuit of Jews with wealth. And the few brave souls who tried to hide and help the Jews. This is the story of one man, a professional architect, who hadn't made much of a mark in his field, being wooed by the offer of money and recognition by the Germans, and a lot of money by a Frenchman trying to help the Jews. With his loyalties, patriotism and biases unclear in his mind, he decides that he can work with both sides. This makes for some intriguing situations and great reading!
It isn't until his life becomes consumed with personal issues that he knows where he truly stands. His transformation is the essence of the story. The author's knowledge of architecture brings a sense of authenticity and reality to the plot. It's always an added bonus when reading a well-researched book, to come away feeling that, along with the great read, one has learned something as well.
Bravo, Charles Belfoure - you have a captivating novel that I will recommend highly!
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