The Paris Correspondent

by Alan S. Cowell

High-profile journalist Alan S. Cowell's latest novel is a fast-paced trip into the dark heart of a newspaper office abroad. Addictive and illuminating, it deftly portrays the rivalries and complicated passions at the story's heart. Ed Clancy and Joe Shelby are journalists with "The Paris Star," an English-language paper based in Paris. Relics from a time when print news was in its heyday, when being a reporter meant watching a city crumble around you as you called in one last dispatch, the Internet age has taken them by surprise. The two friends are faced with the death of what they hold most dear--their careers, and, for Shelby, a woman he cannot bring himself to mention.
"The Paris Correspondent" is a tribute to journalism, love, and liquor in a turbulent era. Written in riveting prose that captures the changing world of a foreign correspondent's life, Alan S. Cowell's breakout novel is not to be missed. Writing from experience and in homage to Reynolds Packard's "Dateline Paris," his razor-sharp and darkly funny style will win readers the world over.

Genres: Fiction, Journalism

272 pages

First published September 15, 2011

About the author

ALAN S. COWELL is a British writer whose career spanned four decades as a foreign correspondent, first for Reuters and then for The New York Times. Alongside news coverage, he authored works of fiction and non-fiction, including The Terminal Spy, a definitive account of the life and death of Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former KGB officer poisoned with radioactive polonium in London in 2006. His novels include Permanent Removal, set in post-apartheid South Africa. Cowell is married and lives in London.

Reviews

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

More than halfway through, I still don't care about the characters. Shelby, the bad boy journalist, is interesting. Always rebellious, sometimes despicable, he could be played by Bill Nighy. I wanted to stick with the book to see what he gets up to.

It's the narrator (Clancy) who feels flat to me, and his wife (Marie Claire) is just too hard to believe, an impossible mix of beauty, smarts, wealth, libido, and cowgirl-in-Paris mavericky independence. She seems like the fantasy woman a middle-aged man would create if the 80s movie "Weird Science" were about middle-aged men.

I wish I could have cared more about the plot. Instead I found myself counting the number of adjectives and strings of modifying clauses on each page (lots and lots of them!). There's a little bit of atmosphere about Paris. There's a lot of reflection on print journalism versus internet news/content delivery. If you liked Tom Rachman's "The Imperfectionists," you *might* like this.

[Rhiannon Ryder · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clancy and Shelby are journalists with an American paper in Paris, beasts of the dying age of print, and struggling to board the Internet age of journalism. Shelby is a past his prime War Correspondent who’s not taming down to a regular Internet journalist well, and since they’re considered a bit of a team it’s younger Clancy’s job to help him settle.

Be warned going in, this book has a dense beginning; it easily took me fifty pages to get the rhythm of the book and for the narrator to get down to it and actually start telling the story. This is humorous if only because the narrator is an editor who busily laments flowery story-telling, for several pages of the book. But the story that spins out of this slow beginning is well worth the effort of getting there, so hold out I tell you, hold out!

The Paris Correspondent is one part homage to yesteryear’s war correspondence, one part mystery and one part character piece. Mixed together it makes a high end cocktail read, which made me feel I should be smoking cigars and wearing something designer to be it's presence. As readers are regaled with stories of Shelby dodging bullets through war zones with his typewriter on his back, they’re simultaneously seeing his difficulty with adapting to old age, infirmities and settling down after so many years of running on adrenaline. Meanwhile they're also getting Clancy's love story with his wife, a french heiress to his poor American beginnings, and between the two it makes for one exotic read.

A quiet surprise of a book, you’ll find yourself swept away with this unusual tale. It lovingly chronicles a dying breed of reporters and it left me with an innate appreciation for how my daily news, be it print or online, comes into being every day.

[Gustavo Vasquez · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book, it's probably one of my favorite books.

I almost didn't read it because of the reviews and the low stars but am I glad I read it.

I might be bias, I love journalism and the aspects of the job. I've worked on several student run newspapers at my community college and CSU, and have a large background with print, and film photography and Leicas.

I found the book highly interesting, and it related to me. Ed Clancy, the main character reminded me of myself. Except I'm 22, not in my 40s/50s.

If you've worked in a newsroom and find journalism as interesting as I do read it.

If you don't have any experience in the field of journalism or don't care for the trade don't. You won't understand half the humor in it.

I will say this, I did get confused at some points with his writing. I would get lost, it seems to jump. But then again I read books by writers like Roberto Bolaño and Cesar Airá, where they explain every detail.

Oh P.S. This is coming from a guy who goes to student government meetings for 4 hrs, because he find it fun. Just a disclaimer.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd recommend this book to anyone who finds old-style newspaper journalism interesting. The main characters, Joe Shelby and Ed Clancey, are a Viet Nam era journalist and editor, respectively, who are assigned to Paris during the rocky transition period between all print journalism and the 24-hour news cycle driven by the Internet. The novel has interesting characters living large, sticky situations, a touch of mystery, many levels of conflict, and more than a bit of angst. The pacing was flawless; I just kept turning pages until I reached the end,

[Dawne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed the read. Although it strayed from reality, the constrasts in medium, message, and lifestyle in the evolution of newspapers was entertaining.

[Gordon Tyrrall · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dreadful in so many ways - feeble characterisation, clunky writing overloaded with adjectives and unnecessary descriptive passages (everytime someone smokes a ciggie or gets in a car you get a lengthy brand-driven description), and non-plot buried under endless anecdotage. I'm sure the author knows the subject well - his account of foreign correspondents is very convincing, and he's worked in the field, after all. That might be the problem - maybe he's writing for his colleagues "look Reggie, you're in chapter 7, that time you threw up over the ambassador!". The characters are indistinguishable, and equally obnoxious - the men especially. They all seem to be well-heeled old bores with a physical disability spouting endless macho bull as they get drunk in expensive Paris restaurants and whine about women they've shared. Half way through I realised that getting through this is going to take me to a new level of speed reading! Still, it is a few hours of my life I'll never get back again.

[Samuel Tucker · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was pretty weak. I think a major creative flaw is creating an outlandish, polarizing character (Shelby in this books case). You run the risk of him coming across not as a hero but a villain, in this case a narcissistic, unscrupulous Old Man who never grew out of his "glory days". The book has predictable plot points, drags on, and doesn't seem to be able to find a through-line. The only thing that saved it was that it did have a lot of information on how journalism has been affected by the digital age, as well as details from the past dog days of publishing. Journalism 101 class attendees may get a kick out of it, but you can skip this one for sure.

[Greta · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Paris Correspondent is a worhwhile read, if you are interested in international news storries and visiting Paris. Our narrator is a life long newspaper man with many acquaintances in the news business from Europe, the Middle East, USA, Asia minor, Africa and more locations around the world. Friendships, war stories, professsional competition, love won and lost are the meat on the bones of these news people. Every day is a new headline and a familiar quest for truth.

[Janet Dillard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting to see the chgs to newspapers & correspondents but felt characters lacked development $ story was hard to follow w at times.

[Alyson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding!

[Carolyn Rector · Rating 3 out of 5]

This story begins as the narrator, Ed Clancy, tells about the Nonstop News Desk, NND, in Paris with his old friend and abettor, Joe Shelby, to post the Internet news in the wee hours of the morning, before New Yorks papers were up and running. Joe Shelby's job was to call the bureaus in foreign cities and verify the stories coming in over the wires, and then to write the copy and Ed is to post it on the Internet. Early in the story Shelby makes a mistake and covers it up and this comes to haunt them in the end. The beginning of the book lays down the character of Joe Shelby, a foreign correspondent, filling in the details of his past loves and past secrets. He is avoiding the women from his past, but they too are in Paris now. Ed Clancy has settled down in Paris with the love of his life, Marie-Claire Risen, and he doesn't want Shelbys interference. It is the story of the demise of print, "that great, gorgeous, messy alchemy of ink and hot type and whirring reels of paper and working stiffs in stained coveralls." This is an action adventure story, with the drama of love spicing things up a bit. It's a story of revenge, and justice, told with a literary bent. A good read if you hang in there through the set-up.

[Margaret Joyce · Rating 4 out of 5]

This interesting narrative is a kind of homage to old print journalism, whose core values of honesty and fairness are championed through the lives- past and present- of the narrator, a reserved, cautious editor,and his flamboyant wartime correspondent buddy, as they painstakingly adjust to the world of digital, non-deadline reporting.
The language is floridly romantic, reflecting the flair and passion associated with the profession of the journalistic wordsmith. It is structured from the point of view of narrator who is telling both his own story, and that of the dying newsprint era.
It becomes uncomfortably clear to the reader that time and timeliness --bedrock of traditional journalism-- are thwarted by the arrival of digital, non-stop reportage.

[Tom · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you've wondered what's like trying to be a journalist when journalism no longer has a sustainable business model this novel may be for you, but it had a lot of jargon that only another journalist would understand. Set in Paris it was less about the first person narrator and more about his craggy journalist counterparts who had their prime when journalism was still a raw and exciting industry rather than spend behind desks at a computer. I don't usually review books I haven't finished but I got 120 pages in and I didn't care what happened to any of these characters and felt I wasn't the audience for this book. Cowell can write but I wasn't interested in his subjects enough to continue.

[Chris · Rating 1 out of 5]

A novel about journalism by a great journalist set in Paris? This seemed like the perfect read for me. That's why I was surprised just how disappointing this was. Characters filled with caricature, language that even I didn't buy and too much "old people who can't figure how this darn computer works" syndrome.

Couldn't finish it. And that's rare for me.

[Marvin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Based on the first 100 pages (after which I bailed), I'd characterize this as an old foreign correspondent's lament for the current state of journalism and nostalgia for its past disguised as a novel. It's written in a cynical, world-weary voice that became, for me, grating after a while.

[Hedva · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you love Paris (like I do) and if you enjoy good storytelling you will enjoy this novel.
Alan Cowell is a good narrator and knows journalism . His English is complex, deep and full of metaphors.
I really enjoyed it!

[Opera4fun · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading about the machinations of the news industry in Paris. Ed and Joe are feeling the discomfort in the modern age of technology and their fear of losing their job and lively hood. I liked the read for the most part - thought the ending was just thrown together - it didn't quite fit.

[Annjeffris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I mostly enjoyed the story but the descriptions of the gorgeous, hot and sexy female characters were a distraction. It seemed that the author was indulging some adolescent fantasies.

[Laura T]

I tried to read this book-I just can't get in to it. Returning it to the library and maybe I'll try again another time.

[AnnieBebop · Rating 4 out of 5]

I couldn't put this one down til I finished it. I think those who gave it less than stellar reviews may have been too young to appreciate it.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing interesting happened until about page 180. That's a long wait, and I can't say the payoff was worth it.

[Sheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for book club. The story itself is OK but it is mostly interesting when they show the changes in the publishing business.

[Kathy Sebesta]

Book never caught my interest. Didn't finish.