BEAUCOUP D’ARGENT

Tell-all book by Hollande’s ex-paramour a smash hit

PARIS • France’s former first lady Valérie Trierweiler, allegedly mocked by François Hollande over her modest origins, looks set to become richer than her ex-partner, thanks to her tell-all book on her troubled times with the president.

Merci pour ce moment ( Thanks For This Moment) has been one of Amazon France’s bestsellers and has sold 442,000 copies since it came out at the start of the month, according to the latest figures from its publisher.

The book is a no-holdsbarred account of Ms. Trierweiler’s nine-year relationship with Mr. Hollande, her 18 months at the Elysée Palace, and their bitter split in January after a gossip magazine revealed his affair with Julie Gayet, an actress nearly 20 years his junior.

Of the many damaging claims, the one that piqued the 60-year-old president most — and which he vehemently denies — was that he despises the poor and refers to them as “sans dents,” or toothless.

Ms. Trierweiler, 49, also claims her ex used to refer to her as Cosette, the poor orphan in Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables and said her family was “pas jojo,” a slang expression meaning they were not a pretty sight.

The former “première dame” was raised in a poor district of the western city of Angers by a disabled father and a mother who worked at the cash desk of an ice rink.

She left her hometown to carve out a comfortable life for herself as a successful political journalist in Paris.

Any financial worries she might have had have now been chased away by the runaway success of Merci pour ce moment, which Le Figaro newspaper calculated has netted her €1.3-million ($1.8-million).

The publisher, Les Arènes, said it thought that figure was “excessive,” but was unable to provide a more exact number when contacted by The Daily Telegraph.

But with the book’s sales showing no signs of abating, and with British and U.S. translated editions in the offing, Ms. Trierweiler is assured of a substantial income for years to come. The book will almost certainly make her richer than Mr. Hollande. When he came to power in 2012, he declared his wealth — consisting mostly of property — to be €1.17-million ($1.6-million).