La Muselivre

A French author promoting her novel in Hong Kong suffered the embarrassment of holding a book-signing that nobody attended, a media report said on Monday. Writer Pierrette Fleutiaux, who won China's literature prize for best foreign novelist in 2001, had to cancel the signing session on Sunday because no one wanted her autograph, the South China Morning Post reported. "It was the first day I arrived and nobody knew me," Fleutiaux, who is promoting her Des phrases courtes, ma chérie, told the paper. The novelist is in the southern Chinese city as part of the first-ever French exhibit at the annual Hong Kong Book Fair. The report said organisers blamed the no-show on a lack of promotion by the French consulate here and by the Alliance Francaise, which promotes French culture overseas. Est-ce que c'est tellement étonnant ?

Via The Elegant Variation