The Reader's Room
by Antoine Laurain
Date: February 8th, 2023
Reviewed by: Anne Durand
On February 8th we met to discuss the book ‘The Readers Room’, by Antoine Laurain. It is a short book, translated from French (everyone agreed the translation was excellent!), with a lot of suspense. We discussed how the author’s greatest source of inspiration – fairytales – might show up in the story, mental health, artificial intelligence and how art/fiction can inspire or even foretell (!!) reality. Overall, we quite liked the book, although not everyone was convinced about the ending.
Like many of Laurain’s novels, this book centers on an object: a book. More specifically, a manuscript from a mysterious author that arrives at the reader’s room of a Parisian publishing house. This debut crime novel ends up published and, spectacularly, longlisted for the most prestigious French literary prize, the Prix Goncourt. Except that the author is nowhere to be found… and that the crimes described in the book look strangely like recently committed murders! Violaine Lepage, the book editor, is looking for answers – and she even starts to wonder what role she might play in the book itself…