Former French First Lady Airs Dirty Linen in Public Via New Book, Disses Husband Francois Hollande
Former French First Lady Valerie Trierweiler just released on Thursday her 320-page book titled Thank You for this Moment, and her ex-husband, President Francois Hollande, is surely not thankful for the release of her tell-all memoirs.
The book could be viewed by readers as her way of getting even with her former husband whom she separated from in January after his affair with actress Julie Gayet, 42, was exposed in media.
In early 2014, the 60-year-old Hollande was photographed going down in the night at a flat a few steps away from the Elysee Palace, hiding his identity by wearing a motorcycle helmet. He rode a three-wheeler Piaggio, driven by a bodyguard, the same fellow who picked him up on the same spot the next morning, with some croissants.
The scandal, headlined in the weekly tabloid Closer, provided fodder for gossip but caused Trierweiler, 49, a journalist for the weekly Paris Match, to be hospitalised for one week.
Fifteen days after the scandal erupted, the couple officially broke up. She recalled the events on Jan 10 when news of Mr Hollande's liaison was published that she took a bagful of sleeping pills from their bathroom and run into their bedroom. However, the president grabbed the bag which ripped, causing the pills to scatter on the bed and floor.
Trierweiler wrote, "I swallow what I can ... I want to sleep. I don't want to live the hours to come." She then became unconscious.
One sample of how she dissed her former husband is the revelation that while Mr Hollande creates the impression that he is a Socialist who hates the rich, in reality he "doesn't like the poor," based on a side comment the president made at a Christmas dinner with her "modest family," cited the French newspaper Le Monde which is one of two publications she allowed to have an advanced copy of her memoir.
The book has a first run of 200,000 copies, reportedly in German language. The tell-all memoir's publication was kept secret and only leaked on Tuesday. Even her own children were unaware of the book, said Olivier Royand, her boss at Paris Match where the former first lady is this week's magazine cover with the headline My Life with Francois.
The president was first married to Segolene Royal, and they have four children. He left Royal in 2007 for Trierweiler, although they had a relationship since 2005. She was often jealous of Royal, a Socialist Party member, especially when the ex-couple appeared together during the 2012 presidential campaign and got heavy applause.
The president, who has become unpopular, declined to comment on the release of the damaging book.
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