François-Henri Désérable's sixth novel, Le Palais, is published on August 20 by Gallimard, a romantic epic about wine that takes its reader from Delhi to the vineyards of Burgundy, via New York and the Marquesas Islands.
An adopted child with an extraordinary gift
Arun Kumar, endowed with an absolute palate capable of recognizing any wine in the world blind, was adopted at the age of eight by a couple of restaurateurs in Beaune after leaving Delhi in 1998. The author makes this extraordinary gift the instrument of a meticulously constructed revenge against the small, closed world of great Burgundy wines, culminating in a trial that hangs over the entire story in Dijon.
Around his main character, François-Henri Désérable creates a gallery of secondary figures sketched with tenderness, humor and sometimes a harsh edge, while reworking the oenological lexical field, which he considers poor and uninventive, with metaphors, to restore all the sensory richness of wine.
A question of authenticity behind the adventure
Behind its serialized energy and narrative pleasure, the novel poses a more serious question: that of authenticity and the price we are willing to pay for a bottle that might not be what it claims to be. A former professional hockey player turned writer, the author, born in Amiens in 1987, had already made a name for himself with *Un certain M. Piekielny*.
This superbly documented 400-page book is both an adventure novel and a wine manual accessible to all, offering a total immersion into the heart of the gustatory and olfactory sensations of its hero.
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