Product Description

'People talk about love at first sight, about the way that men and women fall for each other immediately, but there is also such a thing as friendship at first sight .' In Paris, two couples form an intimacy that will change their lives forever. As they discover the clubs and cafes of the eleventh arrondissement, the four become inseparable, united by deeply held convictions about dating strategies, tunnelling in P.O.W. films and, crucially, the role of the Styrofoam cup in American thrillers. Experiencing the exhilarating highs of Ecstasy and sex, they reach a peak of rapture - the come-down from which is unexpected and devastating. In his latest novel Dyer fixes a dream of happiness - and its aftermath - with photographic precision. Erotic and elegaic, funny and romantic, PARIS TRANCE confirms Dyer as one of Britain's most original and talented writers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #212665 in Books
• Published on: 2003-11-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 278 pages

Review
**'A TENDER IS THE NIGHT for the Ecstasy Age' Tim Pears**'A beautifully composed rave generation rhapsody . dripping with eroticism' SUNDAY TIMES **'A beautiful, remarkable book' GUARDIAN *'A skilfully crafted map of the human heart' INDEPENDENT ** 'Compelling . Dyer is a deft storyteller and has written a rattling good tale' SPECTATOR

SUNDAY TIMES
'A beautifully composed rave generation rhapsody ... dripping with eroticism'

GUARDIAN
'A beautiful, remarkable book'

Customer Reviews

A magnificent work of late twentieth century fiction
'Paris Trance' traces the lives of two newly formed couples in Paris, thrown together by a volatile, and at times uncertain, bond of friendship, love, lust, sex, and drugs, and their adventures and relationships both inside and around Paris. 'Paris Trance' is skilfully executed throughout, capturing everything from the frustration (both emotional and sexual) of a single man in the heat of a Parisian summer, to the attempts of Dyer's narrator to make sense of the flourishing and later degenerating relationships and personalities around him.

Dyer crafts 'Paris Trance' at his own idiosyncratic (and now his trademark) intersection of genres, not least in his fascination with the ability of prose to convey the visual, as with film and photography, while always remaining sensitive to the emotional climate of the world that he creates. Dyer is also clearly the inheritor of the spirit, if not the style, of earlier twentieth century works of fiction such as Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness', and F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'The Great Gatsby' and 'Tender is the Night', with his concern for the degeneration of social relationships and the perils of admiration which approaches hero worship. It is the skill with which Dyer executes his exploration into the nature of highly restricted social circles, bordering on philosophy and social psychology, which makes 'Paris Trance' a magnificent, and thoroughly engaging, work of late Twentieth Century fiction.

Brilliant, wonderful, gorgeous
An elegant and mesmerising novel - really, adjectives don't do it justice! Geoff Dyer evokes a happiness so intense it can't last - and knowing that it doesn't somehow makes the story all the sweeter. Buy this, devour it, and read The Colour of Memory as well - your world will be a better place.

Classy Clubbing Novel
This is a story about two couples in their twenties in Paris enjoying life and having fun. One of the characters, Luke, turns away from life and love for no clear reason and the thrust of the narrative is another character's attempts to understand why he's done this. Since we know it's all going to end in tears, the happy times become all the more poignant. It's very well written and definitely far classier and more thoughtful than your average "we went out clubbing and took loads of drugs" yoof novel.