How Nicolas Sarkozy Survived Twenty Days Behind Bars

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It has been called “the most anticipated book of the year’s end”—a chronicle of life behind bars by the former French President Nicolas Sarkozy. The book’s title is “Le Journal d’un Prisonnier” (“The Journal of a Prisoner”). According to the author, it was written freehand in seven-to-eight-hour spurts from an uncomfortable chair at a flimsy desk in the twelve-square-metre cell that he occupied at La Santé prison, after being convicted in a campaign-finance scandal. His sentence began October 21st and ended less than three weeks later, on November 10th, when he was granted conditional release while appealing the verdict. In France, the book is certainly the most widel