Play Book Tag discussion

This book has it all: history, legend, mystery, chemistry, and a serial killer. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer tells the story of the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, who had a remarkable nose for scent, the ability to smell people from miles away, but had no odor of his own.

It’s split into four sections, each dealing with a different period in Grenouille’s life. In the first part, immediately after his birth in a public market, his mother leaves him to die just as she did with her previous four children. She’s tried for infanticide, executed, and Grenouille is fostered.

At age of eight, he is sold on to Grimal, a tanner, who sets him to work and for whom he works for several more years. All the while, Grenouille learns to differentiate Paris by her many scents.

From Grimal’s tannery, Grenouille takes up work with Giuseppe Baldini, a perfumer who has fallen on hard times. At first reluctant to allow Grenouille to work for him, he soon realizes the benefit of the young man’s olfactory skills

Eventually, Grenouille finds his way to Grasse: the holiest place of perfumery in France. As an apprentice to a great perfumer, he learns the trade and makes some of the most wonderful perfumes Paris had ever smelt. While on his mission to create a scent of his own, he creates a perfume so sweet smelling that it gives the person wearing it control over the emotions of the people around him. He begins to murder young virgin women.

Grenouille had a sinister, powerful charisma. His adventures in finding his perfect scent, manipulating those around him, achieving mastery of his craft, and accomplishing his crimes are amazing. The story also gives a nice historical touch to the story, depicting the poverty, wealth, degradation and depravity of the times in a France that may be post-Revolution but is none the better for the overwhelming changes. The poor and downtrodden are still the poor and downtrodden.

The historic detail in this novel is meticulous and fascinating, as is the process of perfume making, much of which is described here. I've heard both good and bad reviews about this story. I found it quite gruesome but it is still a book worth reading.