She is an autodidact in literature and philosophy, but conceals it to keep her job and, she believes, to avoid the condemnation of the building's tenants. The catalysts are Monsieur Ozu and the names of his and Reneé's cats (after characters in Tolstoy); the means are literature, tea and open hearts and minds. Such a deep divide between the outside image we present to the world and the private landscape of our inner thoughts I believe is present in each and everyone of us, making Madame Renee a proper stand-in for the human condition. I also believe that the hedgehog in us starts to display its spines as we leave childhood behind, thus the need for a second lead character in the person of Paloma Josse. The similarities of the two cases subvert the class divide theory of Madame Renee, demonstrating that neither poverty nor a life of plenty are the deciding factors in the awakening of a higher awareness. Two further quotes should illustrate the point: I've always loved that line from Annie Lennox's Why. This book is about the contents of two characters' heads: Paloma, the 12-yr old suicidal prodigy, and Renée, the 50-something cat-lady concierge. Be careful with these characters, and by that I mean: take care of them, for they are fragile, sad souls in need of understanding and in need, moreover, of someone--anyone--to see through their facades and see them for who they really are. And don't we all need that?

This is the story of two misfits who find comfort, eventually, gratefully, mercifully, in themselves and in others. Who reconcile their heads with their hearts, and find a way of being in the world that is bearable for them. This occurs through the intervention of a third character, Kakuro Ozu, who--while he has his own story, his own pain, his own needs--is somewhat secondary to the story.The world view of the book is conservative. Renee worships the accepted canons of Western art, music, and thinking. She herself epitomizes the upper-middle class women she regards with such scorn. She is one of the most obnoxious characters I've come across in a book. The author expects the reader to sympathize with Renee, but she is boring and self-pitying, among other faults. A cultured Japanese businessman named Kakuro Ozu, whom Renée and Paloma befriend, then takes a room in the same apartment building. Ozu comes to share Paloma's fascination with Renée: that the concierge has the "same simple refinement as the hedgehog". She said, "Isaiah, have you ever met someone at a party or something who finds out you studied philosophy -- and then they just try to talk to you the whole rest of the night about random philosophers they happen to know about, when all you want to do is play beer pong and find someone to make out with?"

I didn't even have enough time to react to this when just a few sentences later, Paloma says, "The truth is that they are just like everyone else: nothing more than kids who don't understand what has happened to them, acting big and tough when in fact all they want is to burst into tears." Twelve-year-old Paloma lives on the fifth floor with her parents and sister whom she considers snobs.Divided into eight luxury apartments, all occupied by distinctly bourgeois families, the building has a courtyard and private garden. So why do Renée and Paloma feel superior? In general, why do people who have a philosophical attitude feel they are better than those around them? Barbery, herself a philosopher, offers various explanations. Philosophers read more than most. They have a proper understanding of grammar, something that's even more important in French than in English: the hysterically funny sequence where Renée vows to kill her neighbour over a superfluous comma is one of the high points of the book. But, above all, they care about things that other people find uninteresting, or don't even notice.