Top ten books about books

Antoine Laurain is a novelist, screenwriter, journalist, director and collector of antique keys. A truly born and bred Parisian, after studying film, he began his career directing short films and writing screenplays. His passion for art led him to take a job assisting an antiques dealer in Paris. The experience provided the inspiration for his first novel, The Portrait, winner of the Prix Drouot.

The Reader’s Room is Laurain's latest book.

At the Guardian, Laurain tagged nine novels and one work of nonfiction that offer "an insight into the strange world of creating books, the bizarre job that is being a novelist and the magic that can exist (sometimes literally) within the books that we read." One title on the list:

Flaubert’s Parrot by Julian Barnes

Geoffrey Braithwaite, a doctor obsessed with Gustave Flaubert, decides to make a pilgrimage to Normandy, the land of his idol. In Rouen, at the Flaubert museum, he is overcome with emotion to find the very parrot who inspired Loulou from the tale A Simple Heart. But at Croisset, Flaubert’s home, there is yet another stuffed parrot. This is the real Loulou, confirms the curator. But which is the true Loulou? A novel filled with humour and unexpected encounters.

Read about another entry on the list.

Flaubert’s Parrot is among Álvaro Enrigue's ten notable books based on other books.

--Marshal Zeringue