Paris, 1870s. The baron Haussmann is about to change the geography of Paris by piercing the winding streets to create wide avenues. In this bubbling atmosphere, real estate speculations are going well; this is how Aristide Rougon, known as Saccard, reaches his fortune. A small civil servant, a small swindler, manipulative and hypocritical, he gets rich by participating in the butchering of Paris, a veritable curse where the Parisian bourgeoisie, greedy and hungry, tear apart the capital like dogs devour a carcass.

The second volume of the Rougon-Macquart series, La Curée portrays a city greedy for pleasure, torn apart by quarrels of power and money. Symbol of the immorality of an entire era, Paris is the witness of all vices. From the Bois de Boulogne to the Grand Boulevards, the characters indulge in adultery, incest and crime. Zola tracks them down in each salon, each hotel, each alcove, with the meticulousness of a chronicler and the verve of a satirist. Gold and flesh: these are the obsessions of a capital rotten to the core, a city of light whose bowels hide the worst darkness.

We read this book in the spring of 2022.