Map Monday – A Murder in Paris

Submitted: 11th August 2025

A Murder in Paris

There’s always that book that you pick up and dive into the pages within – only to find that you have never been here before or even knew it was real.

This book is a thriller but it all takes place in the Lutetia hotel in Paris – one that has existed for years. In WW2, it played a major role holding refugees from the war.

Map of Murder in Paris locations

A Murder in Paris Matthew Blake

Map of Murder in Paris locations

Murder in Paris Matthew Blake

Murder in Paris locations

Where is this hotel?

The Lutetia Hotel is located at 45 Boulevard Raspail. It is actually called The Mandarin Oriental hotel now and is a very well-known luxury hotel in the middle of the city.

Why is this hotel so well known?

The Lutetia used to be known for being a frequent gathering place for anti-Nazi German exiles, who were known as The Lutetia Crowd.

During the war, the hotel tried to house as many as possible. It started to get a reputation for this but when the city was taken over by the Germans, it was actually requisitioned itself and German officers would be seen in and around the hotel. Following the end of the war, the German troops abandoned it and it was used as a repatriation centre for prisoners of war, displaced persons, and returnees from German concentration camps.

Map of Murder in Paris locations

What are the themes of the novel?

The novel follows a thriller where a woman is found with a clouded memory in the hotel. When they track down a member of her family, secrets of the troubled past come to light. Memory, history and loss are key themes in the novel.

Key quote:

“Each survivor from the camps. arrives at Gare d’ Orsay with their striped rags, shaved heads, bone-thin and some barely breathing. This grand hotel is their new temporary home. They are like ghosts returning to the land of the living.”

Map of Murder in Paris locations

POSTCARD-1

A novel that weaves in and out of themes of memory, history and loss. Two timelines and one heck of a mystery. A women heads to Paris as a woman has been found in the hotel claiming that a murder has been committed in one of the rooms. A hotel which played a key role in WW2 and took in many refugees who were returned from the German camps. This started out as a murder mystery but then became a mystery based on the fragility of the mind. A really captivating read.

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