In the wake of the devastating fire that ravaged the 50-year-old historical cathedral Notre-Dame de Paris this month, nostalgic French citizens have showed their patriotism by catapulting The Hunchback of Notre Dame to Amazon’s best-seller list in France.

The 1831 novel by Victor Hugo tells the story of Quasimodo, a good-hearted hunchback who worked as a bell-ringer at the cathedral during the 15th century and fell in love with a beautiful gypsy named Esmeralda.

The story was a runaway success and actually helped draw support for a massive renovation of the cathedral, after Hugo described it in his book as being rife with “countless defacements and mutilations.”

It’s appropriate that the epic 11-volume novel should achieve popularity again, now, with the cathedral once more in need of saving.