The Winner Stands Alone - Couverture souple

The shocking new novel from international superstar Paulo Coelho -- a pulse-pounding psychological thriller. According to Paulo Coelho, The Winner Is Alone is a photograph of the world we live in, captured in the form of a novel. The action, in accelerated rhythm, occurs in less than 24 hours during the Cannes Film Festival. Igor Dalev, a successful Russian entrepreneur, arrives in France determined to recover Ewa, his ex-wife and the great love of his life. Since Ewa is remarried to Hamid Hussein, a stylist and star of the fashion circuit, Igor becomes increasingly desperate, determined to get her attention by any means necessary. And so, crippled by jealousy and passion and, above all, a desire to impress Ewa, Igor becomes a serial killer. By killing innocent people, he believes he is destroying universes and hence demonstrating the strength of his feelings. Producers, consecrated actors, aspiring actresses, top models and stylists -- all of them are portrayed in a merciless portrait of luxury and of the Superclass, the elite who, by influencing people, define the directions of our days.

By providing the reader with details of how these characters -- all of them based on real-life people -- live and behave, Paulo Coelho turns his twelfth novel into a shrewd criticism of a world overrun by glamour and excess. But above all, The Winner Stands Alone is a pulse-pounding, page-turning psycological thriller -- a striking departure for one of the world s best-loved authors.

The beloved, bestselling international author of The Alchemist returns with another haunting novel—a thrilling journey into our constant fascination with the worlds of fame, fortune, and celebrity.

A profound meditation on personal power and innocent dreams that are manipulated or undone by success, The Winner Stands Alone is set in the exciting worlds of fashion and cinema. Taking place over the course of twenty-four hours during the Cannes Film Festival, it is the story of Igor, a successful, driven Russian entrepreneur who will go to the darkest lengths to reclaim a lost love—his ex-wife, Ewa. Believing that his life with Ewa was divinely ordained, Igor once told her that he would destroy whole worlds to get her back. The conflict between an individual evil force and society emerges, and as the novel unfolds, morality is derailed.

Meet the players and poseurs behind the scenes at Cannes—the "Superclass" of producers, actors, designers, and supermodels, as well as the aspiring starlets, has-been stars, and jaded hangers-on. Adroitly interweaving the characters' stories, Paulo Coelho uses his twelfth novel to paint an engrossing picture of a world overrun by glamour and excess, and shows us the possibly dire consequences of our obsession with fame.