…will probably not be a hit here in the U.S. as it talks about the philosopher's experience with being a host as a literary critic for the French show Le Grand Journal – a very popular pop culture show that aims to be an intelligent talk show about politics, culture, T.V., radio, and other stuff, stuff, stuff (they do deal with a lot of stuff, including politicians' tics during a speech – how daring!). Let's be clear: it aims to be intelligent. It also claims to offer edgy, cool and in-depth analysis and discussions about the world.

But all in all Le Grand Journal is pretty shallow. Well, nothing new, it is just a T.V. show, and we can't ask them for scholar work. What has always annoyed the hell out of me, though, is this gap between what they want to show off and their actual way of showing it. And the ultimate example of this is the way they talk about books. To show how smart the show is, they hire people from the CULTURAL world, such as philosophers or literary critics from the public radio. There you have legimitacy, right? Except the poor guy has two minutes to babble three words about a book, and God forbid he uses words with more than two syllables. Well, he sure gets a nice paycheck and he plays the game (I think I would gladly do it). But Ollivier Pouriol couldn't take it. And he writes about how his season as the literary critic in Le Grand Journal has been hell. And we are glad he did, because, hell (that's a lot of hell for one post), we are tired of hearing this show is great, the host Michel Denisot is great, his journalists are great, and they are all a big family hanging out on weekends and having dinner parties like old friends. No, they're not. They are just T.V. people. And they don't like the non assertive guy who is just trying to make us like poetry.

Can't wait to get it here at Moustache Books! Oh, and its title is On/Off by Ollivier Pourriol.

Moustache Books has doubled its inventory since its opening last year. Can you believe we are now carrying OVER A THOUSAND French titles? Oh, that is overwhelming news. Now, breathe a little, browse and make sure you don't get lost in this OVERSIZED (we love a little redondance) FRENCH ONLINE BOOKSTORE. Well, joking apart, we are pretty proud. We are adding more nonfiction, and carefully selecting beautiful kids books, among which this little jewel:

http://www.moustachebooks.com/en/age-3-and-up/996-le-petit-chaperon-rouge-un-livre-accordeon.html

It is the perfect book if you want your child to enjoy a lively and creative Little Riding Hood revisited by a talentuous artist…

Play with the shadows, fold and unfold the pages, make the decor appear and disappear, and of course, beware of the wolf.

With last year's Pascal Quignard's novel on our lap, we are mesmerized (should I say "I"? – we French people like to use the pompous "we" to talk about our little self. On the other hand, we do not capitalize "je" like some with even bigger egos do).

The title? The title is "Les solidarités mystérieuses" and this is one of the best title choices ever made in the history of literature. The writing is sublime. The characters delicate. The story breathtaking. Oh, please, allow us the hyperbole. We are not even trying to sell it by writing this, we are out of stock. You can nonetheless find his latest novel, "Les désarçonnés", published by Grasset in 2012, on our website.

We, at Moustache Books, award it the best novel of the last decade. Writers are fighting for this award, people, you should know that. M. Quignard is probably, even likely, very proud.

In the meantime, if you need a good companion for your winter Sundays, we recommend Patrick Modiano's ever-delightful novel, "L'herbe des nuits". Oh what a treat.

Tiny by size, yet remarkably dense in its content, this book (literally "Louise, she is crazy"), was originally written for theatre by the novelist Leslie Kaplan in 2010.

It is a dialog between two female characters who argue about the world (oh yes) and also about the fact that one of the two talked badly about the other to some gentleman (gossip!).

In French, putting the object of a statement twice in the same sentence, as in "It's beautiful, this landscape" or "The British, they have bad food" or "Jerry Lewis, he is funny" stresses whatever statement is made. It also makes the statement sound like there is no possible arguing with it. The statement "Louise, elle est folle" will be repeatedly used by the two characters throughout their argument. The absentee, Louise, will make a convenient receptacle for all that the two ladies despise, hate, or resent: eating ice cream is unhealthy. But Louise eats ice cream. Yes, but Louise, she is crazy. Well, they don't really talk about ice cream in the play. But they talk about pretty much everything else. The President. Nightmares. Eating meat. And God, of course. Why is he not married? He doesn't need to be, he is self-sufficient. Are married people not self-sufficient?

What is the point of this book, you ask? Well, in about a hundred pages, with humor and clarity, this play questions reality (just like that): what is real? Are we real? And do we need to eat roaches in order to prove our own reality? There is a tiny bit of Beckett in the tone, but the author clearly has her own voice, and the dialog definitely takes place in our good old world, with its supermarkets, swimsuit stores and, of course, God. The two ladies are intimate friends who resent each other. Their tone is at times very harsh and percussive and on the whole deliciously poetic while trivial. Technically it is a theatre play, but you can read it as a poem or like a conversation you would overhear on the subway.

Here is an excerpt that gives a good idea of its dynamic and tone:

"moi j'avais un ami

qui élevait des vaches

une fois on dînait

tout d'un coup

il s'est arrêté

il a regardé son assiette

il a dit Mais c'est la cuisse de Berthe

    la cuisse de Berthe?

Berthe était une de ses vaches préférées

    il l'a mangée?

oui

il l'a mangée

il avait faim

    tu pourrais manger la cuisse d'une vache que tu connais?

[...]

    tu mangerais la cuisse de Berthe?

je ne connais pas Berthe

je ne connais aucune vache

    oui mais

    si tu la connaissais

    Berthe

je ne la connais pas

je ne la connais pas

    oui mais

    si tu la connaissais

je ne peux pas imaginer

    moi si je connais un cochon

    je ne peux pas le manger"

These two women, they don't understand each other. And you, you should read this book.

Moustache Junior, who is now 9 months, has been very good at keeping us away from any type of blogging, as he tried his best to take over the keyboard. We chose to remain silent rather than publishing posts that would have looked like this:

"French author Chloé DLKNb)( u.x CJ.J%.GM: elaume recently publishe%LKVNRbklnklnbklnbd an excellent novzLA,BNIZP'O§È!Ç30956…"

Madame Moustache promises that French Book Notes will stop being a blog about not blogging very soon. She took action. She hired a babysitter.

Catching up soon!