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Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

Patrick Süskind

Start date: August 1, 2015

Finish date: August 31, 2015

Discussion: New School Classics- 1915-2005

Why we're reading this: August 2015 New School Group Read
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New School Classics- 1915-2005

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What Members Thought

Feb 02, 2014 Laura rated it did not like it

Shelves: film-only, suspense-thriller, german-literature, horror, fiction-20th-century, read-2014, 1001-books-you-must-read-before-you, france, hf-18th-century

A movie was made based on this book.

From IMDb:
Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, born with a superior olfactory sense, creates the world's finest perfume. His work, however, takes a dark turn as he searches for the ultimate scent.

So what?? NEXT please!! ...more

6 likes · Like · see review

May 31, 2011 Haze rated it it was amazing

Shelves: haze-s-1000-list, audiobook, 2024-books-read

I remember the first time I read this book; I was in my “scentology” phase and I was fascinated with the sense of smell. I’d been reading a few other books on smell as well, one I remember is The Scent of Desire by Rachel Herz. Obviously unlike The Scent of Desire, this book is fiction, but they were both very interesting.

Rereading it this time, once again I loved how beautiful the writing is. I love how immersed in smells we get. The description of the scents, all the different ways to evoke th ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Jul 23, 2007 Suvi rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: 1970-1999, historical, _france, _europe-western, novels, cities_paris

I felt really unattached to this book. Like there was an invisible wall between me and it. I didn't understand the fascination of endless lists of the perfume ingredients and how useless the characters were. I don't mind a weird book but this had some kind of idiotic weirdness around it and overall seemed kind of flat. ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Sep 06, 2007 Elizabeth rated it liked it · review of another edition

Finished 20 June 2007. Disappointed. It is beautifully written - evoking each scent with it's wonderful descriptions. But the actual story was not compelling and the whole murder thing which didn't really get started until the book was almost finished. ...more

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Jan 09, 2008 Erica rated it did not like it

Shelves: hated, wish-i-had-never-picked-up

Mar 14, 2008 Judith rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1001-books-to-read-before-you-die, 1001-books-read-to-date, fiction, contemporary-authors, film, magical-realism, horror, death, literature-german, dvd