A Waiter in Paris: Adventures in the Dark Heart of the City

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Mine is a world in which the boundaries get tighter and tighter until you can’t really see beyond it. A Waiter in Paris charts Edward Chisholm's jaw-dropping experiences while serving tables in the French capital, a demi-monde of sadistic managers, thieves, fighting for tips and drug dealers. a world of refugees, exiles, dreamers, sadistic and abusive managers, long hours, and, strangely enough, malnutrition . As he observes, “Slice a Parisian bistro in half and you a startlingly accurate cross-section of contemporary French society.

A young Englishman's journey into the merciless world of Parisian restaurants is propulsive, harrowing, and expertly observed. In the UK, the vast majority of our drama, literature, comedy and reporting is created and commissioned by white, middle class, liberally educated men.Edward Chisholm’s memoir of his time as a waiter in Paris goes below the surface of the city and right into its glorious underbelly. A Waiter in Paris is more about the comradery of the kitchen and the political state of Paris which dictates the waiters and cooks than it is about the survival of such a stressful role.

A portrait of Paris is painted by a waiter in this candid memoir that forces you to take off your rose-colored glasses to see the complicated truth of the city. Edward Chisholm has an important story to tell, and it’s told in a fast-paced, cleverly woven style. A restaurant is a theatrical stage of silver cutlery and white serviettes, a ‘smell of wood polish mixed with the perfume of flowers’.All is not as we might hope behind the scenes and the author made clear this is true in any large city with a competitive restaurant scene.