THE TYPEWRITER AND THE GUILLOTINE: AN AMERICAN JOURNALIST, A GERMAN SERIAL KILLER, AND PARIS ON THE EVE OF WWII

Grand Central, 2026

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The thrilling untold story of a trailblazing Paris correspondent for The New Yorker, who sounded the alarm about the rise of fascism in Europe while becoming enmeshed in the sensational case of a German serial killer stalking the streets of the French capital on the eve of WWII.

In 1925, the Indianapolis-born Janet Flanner took an assignment to write a regular ‘Letter from Paris’ for a lighthearted humor magazine called The New Yorker. She’d come to Paris to with dreams of writing about “Beauty with a Capital B.” Her employer, self-consciously apolitical, sought only breezy reports on French art and culture. But as she woke to the frightening signs of rising extremism, economic turmoil, and widespread discontent in Europe, Flanner ignored her editor’s directives, reinventing herself, her assignment, and The New Yorker in the process.

While working tirelessly to alert American readers to the dangers of the Third Reich, Flanner became gripped by the disturbing crimes of a man who embodied all of the darkness she was being forced to confront. Eugen Weidmann, a German con-man and murderer, and the last man to be publicly executed in France—mere weeks before the outbreak of WWII. Flanner covered his crimes, capture, and highly politicized trial, seeing the case as a metaphor for understanding the tumultuous years through which she’d just passed and to prepare herself for the dangers to come.

The Typewriter and The Guillotine offers the personal and professional coming-of-age story of an indomitable journalist set against a glamorous, high-stakes backdrop—a tightly-coiled drama full of romance and intrigue.

Advance Praise for THE TYPEWRITER AND THE GUILLOTINE:

A double whammy coming-of-age story: of Janet Flanner, an American journalist in Paris in the 1920s; of the New Yorker, a brand-new magazine, breezy, giddy, lightweight, and attempting to appeal to the man-about-town reader. Flanner soon finds herself jumping into the deep end, without knowing how deep it is (spoiler alert: as deep as it gets—the rise of fascism, the trial of a murderer); and she convinces the New Yorker to jump right along with her. A remarkable book, highly inventive and wildly original. – Lili Anolik, author of Didion & Babitz

Impeccably researched and elegantly written, The Typewriter and the Guillotine illuminates the glamour and grit of interwar Paris through the eyes of legendary New Yorker correspondent Janet Flanner. Mark Braude transports readers from the smoky cafes of Saint-Germain to the charged streets of Versailles, where Flanner witnessed France’s last public execution. Both intimate and sweeping, this remarkable narrative captures Paris at its most dazzling and dangerous, and Flanner in a moment of creative alchemy–turning history’s darkness into enduring art. -Paula McLain, author of Skylark and The Paris Wife

Thrilling, strange, and altogether wonderful, The Typewriter and the Guillotine proves that nonfiction is as dramatic, unpredictable, and compelling as any fiction. Braude’s book celebrates the great journalist Janet Flanner; evokes the darkness of the wartime world; and exposes the fascinating story of a German con man and serial killer. It’s irresistible. -Susan Orlean

Excerpt:

AUTHOR’S NOTE

What follows is the story of two outsiders whose lives intersected in and around Paris in the dark, desperate years before the Second World War. Both were foreigners in France, having gone there to escape their pasts and secure their futures. Both adapted quickly to their new surroundings, helped by their ability to seduce strangers in several languages, by their physical grace and magnetism, and by their shared gift for paying attention. Both longed for beauty and sought transcendence through great works of music and literature.

One was a journalist, a representative of American self- invention, American wit, and American love for democracy, who discovered that she did her best work outside of America. The other was a German confidence man and killer, a man so misshapen that when the Nazis occupied Paris they tried to destroy all record of his crimes to avoid being tainted by association.

By telling the stories of these two outsiders in tandem, I hope to capture both the brutality of the era in which their lives briefly touched and the strength people summoned to survive it, as they fought to maintain some measure of civility while watching civilization fold in on itself.

Berenice Abbott, Janet Flanner, Alamy