A radio man with a passion for history, Frenchman Philippe Collin has published a first novel set in Paris during the German occupation. The bartender at the Ritz, who has been there since 1921, is Frank Meier, an Austrian who learned the art of cocktails in New York before fighting for France during the First World War. While his duties bring him into contact with German dignitaries and Pétainist leaders, collaborators and resistance fighters, not to mention Sacha Guitry and Coco Chanel, the man is Jewish and no one knows it. “In this war that is now called peace, Frank Meier feels tossed between two worlds that coexist and never cross: the world inside, that of the Ritz, with its pomp, comfort and carnivores, and the world outside, that of hunger, cold and humiliation. “With a consummate art of narration, a prose which naturally assembles facts and inventions, social events and confessions, the author draws us into a microcosm where humanity reveals itself in its most sublime and most grotesque aspects.
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