I read Roman policier, a tale of stolen U's in Pau, by Philibert Humm

Published on 14 August 2026

It's all France Culture's fault, to be honest. I stumbled upon a podcast where Philibert Humm was talking about his book, I think it was the Book Club but I can't even guarantee that, and by the end of the episode the book was ordered on my Kindle. Well played, public radio.

The starting point is a completely true story, and frankly an improbable one. In Pau, for years, someone has been stealing the letter U from the shop signs in the town centre. With the U gone, the "restaurants" become "restarants", the "boucheries" (butcher shops) turn into "bocheries", the Clinique de la Chaussure and Du Pareil au Même got hit too, one shopkeeper ended up filing a complaint, and nobody ever found the culprit. It really is quite mad.

So Humm does what plenty of journalists secretly dream of doing: he goes off to investigate on site with his pal Vincent, who happens to be the actor Vincent Dedienne. The result is Roman policier (literally "detective novel"), published a few months ago by éditions des Équateurs, a crime story with no cops and no corpse, where the investigation often matters less than everything happening around it, the digressions, the bistros, the half-baked theories. He swears it's all true while asking you not to believe him, and it works beautifully.

I found it genuinely funny. It reads easily, it reads fast, and it's exactly the kind of book that's perfect for clearing your head between two doorstoppers. I was coming out of a run of really dense novels, and this one felt like recess, which is a compliment.

To give you some background on Philibert Humm: born in 1991, a reporter at Paris Match, formerly of the culture desk at the Figaro. His writing is full of self-deprecation and a slightly old-fashioned French that is honestly endearing. The kind of pen that digs up words and turns of phrase nobody uses anymore, and manages to make them funny.

Roman policier is his third novel, after Roman fleuve, the account of his descent of the Seine by canoe which earned him the prix Interallié in 2022, and Roman de gare, in which he rides freight trains like the American hobos. I haven't read either of them. But given how much I enjoyed this one, I suspect it will happen one of these days, it really is too delightful a read.

And if you ever pass through Pau, look up at the shop signs. At last report, the U thief is still at large.

You can order it here on Amazon (affiliate link).

By Paingout