PARIS

A COPY OF Irish literary star, Sally Rooney’s novel, Normal People, was used by an angry mob to start a fire in a Jewish bookshop full of the author’s work, in Marseille, says a woman who witnessed the event.

“I was staring into my mirror. I saw the crowd as they burned that book – I know it, I have a copy – and then threw it into the bookshop,” she told the Kookaburra Bugle. “And whoosh! It exploded. And they were all cheering. Some for the burning bookshop; some for the burning book; some for both. One person was actually cheering for all the cheering. The fire threw the shadows of the rioters on to my wall. My mirror took them and reflected them back into the fire. Plus ca change …”