Book description
"Take it with you to any cafe in any city, and Perec will be both your drinking partner and your tour guide, drawing your attention to each little detail coming and going.” –Ian Klaus, CityLab
One overcast weekend in October 1974, Georges Perec set out in quest of the "infraordinary":…Why read it?
1 author picked An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
We are coded as homo sapiens to look at each other. To observe, study, analyse our fellow creatures. One of the reasons I’ll never live in the country is that I’ll miss observing urban life.
This is such a simple book with a simple premise. Perec recorded everything he saw while sitting at a café on a Parisian square over three days. When I lived in Paris in the 1990s, I had a dog-eared French version of this book and I dutifully went to the same place. Not to record my own observations but to try and see things that…
From Mikael's list on The best unexpected books about cities & urbanism.
If you love An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris...
December on 5C4
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
Want books like An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris?
Our community of 13,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris.
Share your top 3 reads of 2026!
And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.
181
readers submitted
so far, will you?
📚 If you like An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris, you might also like...
Child of Vanris
At five years old, Kasiel was found with the pointed ends of his ears cut off. Despite that brutal start, he’s lived twelve peaceful years with the man who took him in. Keeping his hair long over his mutilated ears helps him hide the fact that he is Vanrian, a…
Almost Home
Almost Home is a fictional retelling of the last great tragedy of the Civil War.
In late April 1865, almost 2,000 newly freed Union prisoners of war are packed onto the steamer Sultana, in poor repair and with a listed capacity of 376 passengers. Among them are four Indiana soldiers…
