Paris Match: A Novel

by Christopher Bollen

448 pages, Hardcover

Expected publication April 6, 2027

About the author

Christopher Bollen is a writer who lives in New York City. He regularly writes about art, literature, and culture and is the author of six novels, numerous short stories, articles, essays, and interviews.

His first novel, Lightning People, was published in 2011. His second novel, Orient, was published in 2015. He then wrote The Destsroyers, A Beautiful Crime, and The Lost Americans .

His new novel HAVOC was published December 3, 2024 by Harper.

Describing his novels, The Daily Telegraph notes that "Bollen writes expansive, psychologically probing novels in the manner of Updike, Eugenides and Franzen, but he is also an avowed disciple of Agatha Christie.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Christopher Bollen’s books.. Always a little Highsmith-esque with a good helping of the White Lotus mixed with his own descriptive flair. In each of his books the rich and the poor mingle, there aren’t a lot of heroes, mostly everyone has fluid morals and ambitions that take them to dark places. His settings always play a big part of the story in a way that I love as we’ll. Paris Match sticks with this formula and I was all in. This one is begging to be read over a cappuccino at Le Flore en I’lle on the Ile Saint Louis.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early look.

[Dana · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has so many elements that I really enjoy in a book: murder, Paris, art, flowers, a long con, excellent writing, a great plot, and fun twists. It's my first book by this author and I am thrilled to have given it a chance. I loved it, and I highly recommend it to fans of well written thrillers.

The story is told from two perspectives, the murderer's and that of the innocent bystander, and both are interesting and kept me engaged. The suspense is drawn out, and it's really well done: we know who the murderer is, we just don't know what will happen. The book is unusual in this inverted mystery regard (but not unique) and it works very well in this instance.

There's a tiny feature of the book that I appreciated: the chapter titles did not name the characters they focused on; rather they had a dash in front of the number to indicate one, and just a number for the other. I don't know why this made it feel more literary or something? Anyhow, nice touch!

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for providing a review copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

[Sara Loves Books · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one had SO much atmosphere. Paris, rich people behaving badly, questionable morals... all things I should absolutely eat up. And I really liked Fin and the way Paris almost became a character itself.

Unfortunately, the pacing lost me somewhere in the middle and never completely recovered. For something that leans thriller, I wanted more tension, and then the ending suddenly felt rushed after everything else took its time.

Definitely stylish but I wanted a little more payoff.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!