We are in the center of Paris, in an elegant apartment building inhabited by bourgeois
families. Renee, the concierge, is witness to the lavish but vacuous lives of her
numerous employers. Outwardly she conforms to every stereotype of the concierge: fat,
cantankerous, addicted to television. Yet, unbeknownst to her employers, Renee is a
cultured autodidact who adores art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture. With
humor and intelligence she scrutinizes the lives of the building.s tenants, who, for
their part, are barely aware of her existence. Then there.s Paloma, a twelve-year-old
genius. She is the daughter of a tedious parliamentarian, a talented and startlingly
lucid child who has decided to end her life on the sixteenth of June, her thirteenth
birthday. Until then she will continue behaving as everyone expects her to behave:
a mediocre pre-teen high on adolescent subculture, a good but not an outstanding
student, an obedient if obstinate daughter.

Paloma and Renee hide both their true talents and their finest qualities from a world
they suspect cannot or will not appreciate them. They discover their kindred souls
when a wealthy Japanese man named Ozu arrives in the building. Only he is able to gain
Paloma.s trust and to see through Renee.s timeworn disguise to the secret that haunts
her. This is a moving, funny, triumphant novel that exalts the quiet victories of the
inconspicuous among us.

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