Why the French pooh-pooh the President's ex The French may be notorious for their extra-marital affairs, but it seems the principle, "l'information s'arrête à la porte de la chambre à coucher" or "information stops at the bedroom door," dictates their attitudes towards the book. It's one thing to have copious amounts of sex behind closed doors - but quite another to ruin the country's perfectly chic image through a tawdry book. "She was part of this cosy world, she was fed and watered by the state and since she's been kicked out, she's tried to make money off it," says Parisian Nicolas, who works in financial services and lives in Kensington, London. It's fairly un-French and vulgar to behave that way. Others say that the book has only sold so many copies because readers are sniggering at the author's writing style. "It's extremely badly written - the book sounds like a teenage girl," says Johann Choron, 28, who's originally from Picardie but now works at Google in London. She said it took her six months to write the book but seriously, in six days you could write something better. It reads like a Closer article and it's not a good image. Choron says he has no sympathy for Trierweiler's personal story. Everybody has been dumped at some point in their life, it's not easier or harder for her - get over it. She's making herself completely ridiculous by what she's writing. Early sales of Trierweiler's book have topped those of Fifty Shades of Grey but several French bookstores have refused to stock her memoirs, claiming, "We have 11,000 books. We are not here to be the dustbin for Trierweiler and Hollande. But Anne-Elisabeth Moutet, a Paris-based journalist who often writes for The Telegraph, says these "high-minded little leaflets" are simply "unbelievably snotty." Moutet argues that distaste for Merci Pour Ce Moment is nothing more than "po-faced superciliousness." "It is delicious gossip, everybody's talking about it," she says. "The hypocrisy is that people say, "I'm not interested, she's a totally uninteresting woman." She may not be a nice woman or a clever woman, but in terms of interest she is riveting. The French are lying to themselves, she says, because enjoying political gossip is damaging for their self image - "It's like the sidebar of shame on the Daily Mail website," she says. But I think the book is a Balzac novel. It's about money, class, power, betrayal - it's absolutely fascinating. There may be many differences between the French and the British, but surely our immaculately high-minded friends across the channel will struggle to ignore a tale of sex and power. Nobody can resist the allure of Valérie Trierweiler.