The Other Story
Tatiana de Rosnay

I’m crying all over and wishing I didn’t have to wait so long for this to be released – I just want to talk to someone about The Other Story!

For most of the book, I didn’t particularly care for Nicolas, but I wasn’t supposed to. A successful author, his first and only novel went on to be an international bestseller, and an Oscar winning moving (starring Robin Wright, we are repeatedly reminded.)

Now, caught up in his fame, Nicolas is too absorbed with his image to concentrate on writing. He admits it only to himself – he’s lazy. However the world – his editor, his family, his friends, his fans – believe he’s hard at work on a second book.

Set over the course of three days at a luxurious Italian resort, Nicolas tries to relax and write. He observes the other guests, an interesting array of the wealthy foreigners, but is more curious about how they see him. The love of his life has left, his family is fed up with him, and true friends have become rare. Nicolas is disgustingly self absorbed.

And yet, there’s the underlying story of who he was before fame, the mystery that inspired his novel and its lovable heroine. Nicolas’s father – Theodore – drowned when Nicolas was a boy, leaving him with only fond memories and an affinity for interesting watches. When Nicolas discovered that Theodore was not the Frenchman he believed, but Russian with unknown roots, Nicolas began to investigate.

Nicolas’s search for the truth, a suspenseful mystery, is laced throughout the present alongside memories of his ex and the rise to fame, a weird sexual email correspondence with a stranger, and brooding paragraphs of self loathing.

When an old friend finally confronts Nicolas, everything begins crashing  down around him and his vacation from the world suddenly becomes the moment of his reckoning.

You don’t have what it takes to be a writer. To be a writer, you need to suffer … you don’t suffer. You don’t bleed. You used to … You suffered when you found out who your father really was … You wrote that book with your tears and your blood. You now thrive on your worldwide success.

Is Nicolas too far gone, or can he redeem himself?

Read it, enjoy de Rosnay’s writing (she’s phenomenal!) and don’t lose hope!