Impossible City

A portrait of Parisian society ... the style is elegant and flinty, the humour dry -- Andrew Martin * Literary Review * [A] revealing memoir ... Kuper is a clear-eyed observer of all the history that is happening all around him ...for all the transformations of the past two decades, however, Kuper is always alert to the city's particularity * Observer * A lively read that captures many of the capital's contradictions * Economist * Highly readable and amusing prose ... Kuper is a charming guide, with a particularly good eye for the telling quote * New Statesman * With the perspective of a foreigner, and two decades as a Paris resident behind him, Kuper chronicles the paradoxical complexities of Parisian life in his memoir -- 'Best summer books of 2024' * Financial Times * Simon Kuper does a great job in conveying why Paris is a city that is impossible to embrace and impossible to resist ... very funny * Irish Examiner * Praise for Chums: 'A searing onslaught on the smirking Oxford insinuation that politics is all just a game. It isn't. It matters -- Matthew Parris A gripping read ... exquisite and depressing in equal measure -- Matthew Syed * Sunday Times * A sparkling firework of a book -- Lynn Barber * Spectator * Incisive, insightful and timely -- Richard Beard * New Statesman * Fascinating ... The picture Kuper draws is of a nation with a decadent and deeply unprofessional ruling class, a diagnosis with which it is impossible to disagree -- Hugo Rifkind * The Times * A must-read for admirers of the City of Light -- Mark Brocklesby * Jersey Evening Post *

Simon Kuper is an author and Financial Times journalist, born in Uganda and raised around the world. An Oxford graduate, he later attended Harvard as a Kennedy Scholar. He has written for the Guardian, Observer, and The Times and is also the author of Chums, The Happy Traitor, Football Against the Enemy and Bara. He lives in Paris with his family