Georges Frangin wakes up one morning to instant fame. People stop and stare as he walks down the street, snapping pictures and watching him in awe as they would a bona fide celebrity. When a popular television show calls to confirm his appearance and he learns that there is a book to be written about his life, Frangin must deal with his newfound status. There is only one problem: no one knows what exactly he is famous for. He can’t sing, dance, act, write, or distinguish himself in any way from the general population. Far from seeing this as a necessary obstacle to fame, the people around him mostly urge him to accept his fate. L’Idole, alternately hilarious and unsettling, devastatingly attacks the “cult of celebrity” through the overnight metamorphosis of a lonely, single and thoroughly mediocre forty-year old man.

This is Serge Joncour’s sixth novel. Two of his earlier ones, In Vivo (Flammarion, 2002) and UV (Le Dilettante, 2003) won the “Prix France Télévisions.” VU is to be published by Transworld in the UK.