The Hotel on Place Vendome: Life, Death, and Betrayal at the Hotel Ritz in Paris

Description

Established in 1898 in the heart of Paris on the Place Vendome, the Hotel Ritz instantly became an icon of the city frequented by film stars and celebrity writers, American heiresses and risque flappers, politicians, playboys, and princes. In June 1940, when France fell to the Germans, orders from Berlin specified that the Hotel Ritz would be the only luxury hotel of its kind in occupied Paris. Tilar J. Mazzeo traces the history of this cultural landmark from its opening in fin de siecle Paris to the modern era. At its center, The Hotel on Place Vendome chronicles life at the Ritz during wartime, when the hotel simultaneously served as headquarters to the highest-ranking German officers, such as Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering, and home to wealthy patrons (and to the spies among them) who stayed on in Paris. Mazzeo takes us into the grand palace's suites, bars, dining rooms, and wine cellars, revealing a hotbed of illicit affairs and deadly intrigue, as well as stunning acts of defiance and treachery. The result is the story of The Hotel on Place Vendome-a singular season at the world-class hotel, an intimate and riveting portrait of the last days of the Second World War.

Tilar J. Mazzeo is the author of numerous works of cultural history and biography, including the New York Times bestselling The Widow Clicquot, The Secret of Chanel No. 5, and nearly two dozen other books, articles, essays, and reviews on wine, travel, and the history of luxury. The Clara C. Piper Associate Professor of English at Colby College, she divides her time between coastal Maine, New York City, and Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

"This gorgeously written (and photographed) book is a feast for readers wanting to be swept away this summer... Tracing the captivating history of Paris's world-famous Hotel Ritz, Mazzeo reveals a hotbed of illicit affairs and deadly intrigue, as well as stunning acts of defiance and treachery." -- Brad Thor, The Today Show Summer Reads "Stolen art, double agents, a legendary bartender passing notes to the resistance: This is a rich, messy history." -- Kirkus Reviews "Mazzeo pulls back the heavy curtains of the Ritz in Paris to reveal a steamy world of sex, drugs, partying and political intrigue." -- Alan Riding, author of And The Show Went On: Cultural Life in Nazi-Occupied Paris "Mazzeo enthrallingly depicts a hotbed of both the magnificent and the mundane... Readers will enjoy Mazzeo's fascinating collection of secretive, scheming historical characters, all under one elegant roof." -- Publishers Weekly "Fiction could not write betrayal, resistance, collaboration, or celebration with more robustness or with a more alluring who's-who of writers, artists, and military powers than history did in this single hotel. " -- Booklist "Tilar J. Mazzeo tells the tale of the Hotel Ritz, a landmark so imbued with glamour that it was the only hotel in Paris the Nazis ordered to stay open during the war. The antics at and around it during World War II were often shocking." -- New York Post "Must read... Mazzeo artfully transports readers to the Nazi occupation of World War II ... The Hotel on Place Vendome contextualizes the opulence of 1940s Paris, making for a work of history that reads as enticingly as a novel." -- Harper's Bazaar "An illuminating history of the intrigue and drama taking place inside its elegant facade... The narrative reads like fiction, with the difference being accurate testimony from well-researched documents and interviews." -- Bookreporter