Muriel Barbery: The Elegance of the Hedgehog

Am I the only person who didn't love this book? I picked it up at the airport a few months ago, inspired by all the hype from magazine reviews and blogs alike. I have to say I read it in a short time and I liked it pretty well in the beginning, but gradually I started to get annoyed with the protagonist and that ruined the book for me, since the whole story rests upon the sympathy it can encourage towards the main character. This is Renée, a middle-aged consierge of an elegant building in Paris, who outwardly is everything society expects from her - fat, addicted to television, totally alone except for her cat - but who actually is (supposedly) an intelligent, knowledgeable autodidact, who loves books, art, music and philosophy. The only other important character in the book is Paloma, a 12 year old who lives in the building and has decided to end her life on her thirteenth birthday. She is also very much misunderstood, by her family in this case, and spends time listing "profound thoughts" which generally boil down to reasons why everyone around her is stupid and life is not worth living. The two points of view alternate in first-person chapters as gradually the two characters get to know each other and find comfort in one another's understanding and esteem. The problem is that they are so busy scrutinizing their neighbors and criticizing their stupidity and their interest  in onlyfutile things that they end up sounding like complete snobs themselves. Of course the victims of their sarcasm are people who look down on them, while they are probably culturally and intelligently their inferiors, but still, by mocking their every word the main characters don't come off much better. And ok, Paloma is professedly a disagreable cynic who hates the world and all the people in it, but Renée is supposedly a sweet, insightful woman with an eye for beauty in all its forms. How are we supposed to believe this when she appears to consider herself better than anyone around her? The only time she is likeable is when we see her with the only other character besides Paolma that she likes, Monsiour Ozu. Finally in her relationship with him we see a more human, and humble, side of her, given all the insecurities of a 54 year old getting ready for a date. Monsieur Ozu is a very likeable character himself, and one of the three things I appreciated of this book, along with the quaint French atmosphere and the unexpected ending. The book's message is pretty obviously to dig deeper and not be deceived by the appearance of things, and the two leading ladies are different from what the other characters expect, just not in the way the author, I suppose, intended them to seem. As for the acclaimed deep philosophical reflections on art, time and the meaning of life, (which also are supposed to show the uniqueness and brilliance of the two ladies) they actually boil down to a bunch of pretentious platitudes and a few apparently erudite, but really clichéd, quotes.