by Émile Zola
Part of Les Rougon-Macquart, book 3
First published 2006
Florent Quenu stumbles back into Paris after years of political exile, gaunt and desperate. He finds refuge with his half-brother Quenu, now a prosperous pork butcher in Les Halles, the sprawling central food markets. But Florent cannot escape his revolutionary past or his disgust with the bourgeois excess surrounding him. The massive market halls teem with vendors, gossips, and informants who view this thin, serious man with suspicion. His attempts to build a new life teaching and eventually organizing another political conspiracy put him at odds with a community that values commerce over conscience. As Florent struggles between his ideals and the suffocating reality of Second Empire society, the markets themselves become his enemy. The abundance of food mocks his years of hunger while the petty rivalries and surveillance of market life threaten to destroy him again. Zola creates a world where survival depends on embracing the very materialism that Florent finds morally repugnant.
Genres: fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, 19th-century
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, social-commentary
Setting: Paris, Les Halles
Period: Second Empire
654 pages · Paperback · Green Integer Books