Die Bestie von Paris und andere Geschichten

The Beast of Paris and other stories span the 20th century in Paris in all its facets: Marie-Luise Scherer sets out on the trail of two serial killers who terrified the French capital in the 1980s with a series of robbery-murders of elderly single ladies. With a refreshingly cold and dissectingly sharp eye, she describes the last hours of the murdered women's lives as well as the temptations of the Parisian demimonde. She meets one of the first surrealists, the poet Philippe Soupault, and captures the literary atmosphere of early 20th century Paris. She takes us to the filming of Volker Schlöndorff's adaptation of A Love of Swann and opens the doors to the Parisian fashion world by mingling with the extravagant crowd at prêt-à-porter shows for a week.

What connects these stories is, of course, Paris, the City of Light, which continues to be the muse for a wealth of wonderful and compelling stories, such as those told here by Marie-Luise Scherer. It is this impressive ease with which Scherer switches from one milieu to another and, dispensing with any feuilletonistic platitudes, always lets the world itself speak, which made Gustav Seibt claim: "Marie-Luise Scherer can do anything.".