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THE HOUSE OF HAPPINESS by Paul Guimard

THE HOUSE OF HAPPINESS

By

Publisher: Houghton, Mifflin

Christmas in Paris is the background of this novel of love caught in the web of modern cliches. To Julien, a seller of lottery tickets, it is a Christmas which offers a community of sympathy but delivers a blow of final isolation; to the teen-aged actress, Catherine, a Christmas which portends to fulfill the carefully constructed dream of super advertising, but, in fact, brings purgation; and to Francois, Christmas, while offering the salvation of his art, brings instead compromise and the placebo of love. In constructing a world governed by antic fate, Paul Guimard is both imaginative and entertaining, but not skillful enough to disguise the carefully manipulated skeleton beneath his body of random detail. In the mood of Nathaniel West, but a pastel version of the original, The House of Happiness will be read for entertainment and for testimony that the Gallic personality is retiring behind the flag of commercialism.