Gilles Perrault

After the success of his essay Les parachutistes (1961), inspired by his military service in Algeria, he became a journalist and wrote articles about Nehru's India, the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and the problems of African Americans in the United States.

In 1978, Perrault published Le Pull-over rouge, a novel in which he criticized the method of investigation done by the French police around the 1974 death of an eight-year-old girl.

Perrault's case, calling Ranucci's guilt into question, held a great influence in the debate upon capital punishment in France.

Perrault's book Le Garçon aux yeux gris (2001) was adapted by André Téchiné for the film Les Égarés.

The book highlits the role of Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, the well known theatre author, as an arms dealer, secret agent and shipwner, running war supplies to the Insurgents.