Éric Deschodt

Éric Deschodt (born 30 March 1937) is a French journalist, writer and translator. He wrote police novels under the pseudonym Bernard-Paul Lallier.

Biography Éric Deschodt was Anne-Marie Deschodt's brother.

After graduating from high school and a bachelor's degree in philosophy, he became a journalist for Radio France, then worked in various fields: agricultural machinery salesman, painting representative, art publisher, fish farmer in Camargue. He eventually returned to journalism and worked successively for several publications, including Jours de France, Valeurs actuelles and Le Figaro.

Under the pseudonym Bernard-Paul Lallier, he published Le Saut de l'ange (1968), a detective novel that won that year's Prix du Quai des Orfèvres and was adapted under the eponymous title in cinema by Yves Boisset in 1971. This novel was followed by the sequel L'Ange du paradis, published in 1969. In 1977, Deschodt used the same pseudonym to write the thriller Terreur à Nantes.

Éric Deschodt published essays on French aviation and cigar making under his patronym, 10 or so novels, and biographies of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Octave Mirbeau, André Gide, Agrippa d'Aubigné, Gustave Eiffel and Attila. He also wrote translations, including Ceux de Falesa by Robert Louis Stevenson and Mickey Spillane's detective novels.

Work

Novels 1977: Les Demoiselles sauvages, Paris, JC Lattès 1979: Le Général des galères, JC Lattès 1981: Les Îles captives, JC Lattès 1982: La Gloire au Liban, JC Lattès 1984: Le Roi a fait battre tambour, JC Lattès 1985: Eugénie, les larmes aux yeux, JC Lattès 1988: Le Royaume d'Arles, JC Lattès 2000: Le Seul Amant, Paris, Éditions du Seuil (in collaboration with Jean-Claude Lattès) 2003: Le Scorpion d'or, Paris, La Table Ronde 2004: Marguerite et les Enragés : meurtre à Florence, Seuil (in collaboration with Jean-Claude Lattès) 2011: Iphigénie Vanderbilt, Paris, Robert Laffont 2013: Les Amants du grand monde, Paris, Éditions de Fallois

Detective novels signed Bernard-Paul Lallier 1984: Le Saut de l'ange, Paris, Fayard 1969: L'Ange du paradis, Fayard 1977: Terreur à Nantes, Paris, Librairie des Champs-Élysées, n°1489

Essays 1977: La France envolée : l'aviation et la décadence 1906–1976, Paris, Société de production littéraire 1993: Histoire du Mont-de-Piété, Paris, Le Cherche-Midi 1996: L'ABCdaire du cigare, Paris, Flammarion, "Art de vivre" 1996: Le Cigare, Paris, Éditions du Regard 1996: D'un musée l'autre en Picardie, Éditions du Regard 2002: So British: Old England, Paris, Éditions du Regard 2005: Château Lagrézette, Éditions du Regard, (in collaboration with Alain-Dominique Perrin) 2009: Lafite Rothschild, Éditions du Regard

Biographies 1980: Saint-Exupéry, Jean-Claude Lattès 1989: Mirbeau, roman d'une terre de France, Jean-Claude Lattès 1991: Gide : le « contemporain capital », Paris, Perrin 1994: L'Orgueil du guerrier : Claude Barrès, Perrin 1995: Agrippa d'Aubigné : le guerrier inspiré, Paris, Robert Laffont 2002: Gustave Eiffel : un illustre inconnu, Paris, Pygmalion 2006: Attila, Paris, Gallimard, Folio. Biographies n°13 2014: Pour Clemenceau, Paris, Éditions de Fallois

Prizes 1968: Prix du Quai des Orfèvres for Le Saut de l'ange, novel signed under the pseudonym Bernard-Paul Lallier 1981: Prix Roland de Jouvenel for Saint-Exupéry 1984: Prix Roland de Jouvenel for Le roi a fait battre tambour 1986: Prix des Deux Magots for Eugénie les larmes aux yeux 1996: Prix de la biuographie for Agrippa d'Aubigné, le guerrier inspiré

Cinematographic adaptation 1971: , French film by Yves Boisset, with Jean Yanne, Senta Berger and Sterling Hayden