The Little Pleasures of Paris


Book Description

A book of illustrations celebrating French culture and must-see sites in the capital of France—a perfect gift for a travel lover or Paris enthusiast. Take an enchanting tour of Paris’s most charming places, objects, and pastimes in this lovingly compiled Francophile handbook. Organized by season, The Little Pleasures of Paris takes the reader through a year’s worth of quintessentially Parisian experiences, from secret gardens bursting with roses to exotic plumage at the city’s bird market, candied violets at Paris’s oldest sweet shop, dazzling colors in the stained glass at Sainte-Chapelle, and more. The friendly text and whimsical illustrations make this delightful ebook a poetic letter to the City of Light. Unusual details that might otherwise go unnoticed are celebrated and offer a uniquely intimate perspective in this triomphe of je ne sais quoi and joi de vivre!




True Pleasures


Book Description

Meet the dazzling women of Paris; from Colette to Nancy Mitford; Marie Antoinette to Coco Chanel; Napoleon's Josephine to Edith Wharton. Rule-breakers and style-setters, these women were utterly diverse, yet they shared one common passion - Paris, the world's headquarters of femininity. At a turning point in her life, Lucinda Holdforth journeys to Paris and takes a very personal tour through the lives, loves and losses of its celebrated women. She evokes the incarnations of the city from Louis XIV through the French Revolution, two world wars and the Paris of the new millennium. And, as she walks in their footsteps, Lucinda draws inspiration from the fascinating women who created and nurtured the world's most civilised city. This enjoyable companion will seduce and delight - and inspire every woman in search of her own true pleasures...




Paris in Color


Book Description

Take a journey through the world's most romantic city, traveling from color to magnificent color with this beguiling book. An orange café chair, bright blue bicycles against a fence, a weathered white door—Nichole Robertson's sumptuous photographs of the distinctive details of Paris, all arranged by color, evoke a sense of serendipitous discovery and celebrate the city as never before. At once a work of art and a window into the heart of the city, Paris in Color will surprise and delight those who love art, design, color, and, of course, Paris!




Living the Simply Luxurious Life


Book Description

What can you uniquely give the world? We often sell ourselves short with self-limiting beliefs, but most of us would be amazed and delighted to know that we do have something special - our distinctive passions and talents - to offer. And what if I told you that what you have to give will also enable you to live a life of true contentment? How is that possible? It happens when you embrace and curate your own simply luxurious life. We tend to not realize the capacity of our full potential and settle for what society has deemed acceptable. However, each of us has a unique journey to travel if only we would find the courage, paired with key skills we can develop, to step forward. This book will help you along the deeper journey to discovering your best self as you begin to trust your intuition and listen to your curiosity. You will learn how to: - Recognize your innate strengths - Acquire the skills needed to nurture your best self - Identify and navigate past societal limitations often placed upon women - Strengthen your brand both personally and professionally - Build a supportive and healthy community - Cultivate effortless style - Enhance your everyday meals with seasonal fare - Live with less, so that you can live more fully - Understand how to make a successful fresh start - Establish and mastermind your financial security - Experience great pleasure and joy in relationships - Always strive for quality over quantity in every arena of your life Living simply luxuriously is a choice: to think critically, to live courageously, and to savor the everydays as much as the grand occasions. As you learn to live well in your everydays, you will elevate your experience and recognize what is working for you and what is not. With this knowledge, you let go of the unnecessary, thus simplifying your life and removing the complexity. Choices become easier, life has more flavor, and you begin to feel deeply satisfying true contentment. The cultivation of a unique simply luxurious life is an extraordinary daily journey that each of us can master, leading us to our fullest potential.




A Pig in Provence


Book Description

A woman and her family give up life in 1970s America for a farmhouse in southern France in this memoir peppered with delicious French recipes. From the publisher of Under the Tuscan Sun comes another extraordinary memoir of a woman embarking on a new life—this time in the South of France. In 1970, James Beard Award–winning author Georgeanne Brennan set out to realize the dream of a peaceful, rural existence en Provence. She and her husband, with their young daughter in tow, bought a small farmhouse with a little land, and a few goats and pigs and so began a life-affirming journey. Filled with delicious recipes and local color, this evocative and passionate memoir describes her life cooking and living in the Provençal tradition. Praise for A Pig in Provence “You can almost smell the lavender as you follow Brennan’s love affair with the province that became her second home and shaped the culinary persona of this cooking teacher and food author. Brennan is a talented storyteller.” —San Francisco Chronicle “Georgeanne Brennan’s captivating memoir reminds me of why I, too, was enchanted by Provence. She beautifully captures the details of living in a place where the culture of the table ties a community together—where everyone knows the butcher and the baker, and everyone depends on the farmers.” —Alice Waters, owner, Chez Panisse “Fascinating . . . Brennan revels equally in the preparation and consumption of the regional cuisine You can almost hear her lips smacking.” —The New York Times Book Review “Georgeanne Brennan’s romance with Provence continues to deepen, and the result of her long residence there is an intimacy with local people, food, and folkways. I would love to pull up a chair to her table.” —Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan Sun




Agatha of Little Neon


Book Description

A National Book Foundation "5 Under 35" Honoree “An enchanting, sparkling book about the many meanings of sisterhood.” —Kristin Iversen, Refinery29 Claire Luchette's debut, Agatha of Little Neon, is a novel about yearning and sisterhood, figuring out how you fit in (or don’t), and the unexpected friends who help you find your truest self Agatha has lived every day of the last nine years with her sisters: they work together, laugh together, pray together. Their world is contained within the little house they share. The four of them are devoted to Mother Roberta and to their quiet, purposeful life. But when the parish goes broke, the sisters are forced to move. They land in Woonsocket, a former mill town now dotted with wind turbines. They take over the care of a halfway house, where they live alongside their charges, such as the jawless Tim Gary and the headstrong Lawnmower Jill. Agatha is forced to venture out into the world alone to teach math at a local all-girls high school, where for the first time in years she has to reckon all on her own with what she sees and feels. Who will she be if she isn’t with her sisters? These women, the church, have been her home. Or has she just been hiding? Disarming, delightfully deadpan, and full of searching, Claire Luchette’s Agatha of Little Neon offers a view into the lives of women and the choices they make.




Paris in Love


Book Description

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the author of Wilde in Love, a joyful chronicle of a year in one of the most beautiful cities in the world: Paris. “What a beautiful and delightful tasting menu of a book: the kids, the plump little dog, the Italian husband. Reading this memoir was like wandering through a Parisian patisserie in a dream. I absolutely loved it.”—Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love When bestselling romance author Eloisa James took a sabbatical from her day job as a Shakespeare professor, she also took a leap that many people dream about: She sold her house and moved her family to Paris. With no classes to teach, no committee meetings to attend, no lawn to mow or cars to park, Eloisa revels in the ordinary pleasures of life—discovering corner museums that tourists overlook, chronicling Frenchwomen’s sartorial triumphs, walking from one end of Paris to another. She copes with her Italian husband’s notions of quality time; her two hilarious children, ages eleven and fifteen, as they navigate schools—not to mention puberty—in a foreign language; and her mother-in-law Marina’s raised eyebrow in the kitchen (even as Marina overfeeds Milo, the family dog). Paris in Love invites the reader into the life of a New York Times bestselling author and her spirited, enchanting family, framed by la ville de l’amour. Praise for Paris in Love “Exhilarating and enchanting . . . brims with a casual wisdom about life.”—Chicago Tribune “In this delightful charm-bracelet of a memoir, [Eloisa James shares] her adventures as an American suddenly immersed in all things French—food, clothes, joie de vivre.”—People “Enchanting . . . gives the reader a sense of being immersed along with James in Paris for a year . . . you see the rain, taste the food, observe the people.”—USA Today “This delectable confection, which includes recipes, is more than a visit to a glorious city: it is also a tour of a family, a marriage, and a love that has no borders. Très magnifique!”—Library Journal (starred review) “A charming, funny and poignant memoir . . . steeped in Paris and suffused with love.”—Star Tribune “Charming . . . a romance—for a city, a life, a family, and love itself.”—The Huffington Post




My Place At The Table


Book Description

In this debut memoir, a James Beard Award–winning writer, whose childhood idea of fine dining was Howard Johnson’s, tells how he became one of Paris’s most influential food critics Until Alec Lobrano landed a job in the glamorous Paris office of Women’s Wear Daily, his main experience of French cuisine was the occasional supermarket éclair. An interview with the owner of a renowned cheese shop for his first article nearly proves a disaster because he speaks no French. As he goes on to cover celebrities and couturiers and improves his mastery of the language, he gradually learns what it means to be truly French. He attends a cocktail party with Yves St. Laurent and has dinner with Giorgio Armani. Over a superb lunch, it’s his landlady who ultimately provides him with a lasting touchstone for how to judge food: “you must understand the intentions of the cook.” At the city’s brasseries and bistros, he discovers real French cooking. Through a series of vivid encounters with culinary figures from Paul Bocuse to Julia Child to Ruth Reichl, Lobrano hones his palate and finds his voice. Soon the timid boy from Connecticut is at the epicenter of the Parisian dining revolution and the restaurant critic of one of the largest newspapers in the France. A mouthwatering testament to the healing power of food, My Place at the Table is a moving coming-of-age story of how a gay man emerges from a wounding childhood, discovers himself, and finds love. Published here for the first time is Lobrano’s “little black book,” an insider’s guide to his thirty all-time-favorite Paris restaurants.




Paris in Winter


Book Description

A newly expanded edition of the beloved Paris in Winter absorbs readers into magic of the City of Light, showcasing its serendipitous essence and cultural treasures anew with a captivating contemporary introduction and whimsical illustrations by author and artist David Coggins Paris in Winter strikes again with a brand new edition including new watercolor drawings with fanciful ink and charming vignettes featuring moments from Coggins’ family's annual New Year's sojourns to Paris, which, because of their unending love for the city, they've been taking together for almost 25 years. This memoir of poetic, lighthearted stories highlights the family's passion for art, food, fashion, and social life. Family rituals—from having lunch each January at the delightful Le Grand Vefour to haunting favorite antique shops and seeking out-of-the-ordinary spots, like a little known garden or a gypsy circus—are interspersed with serendipitous moments: hearing Bono sing "Happy Birthday" to a friend in a bistro, adopting an abandoned lap dog, and the simple pleasures of Parisian street life. Coggins's delicate and intimate drawings capture classic Parisian scenes as well as family and friends against the backdrop of the elegant City of Light under the cloak of winter. Across cafes and hotels, apartments and galleries, the family mixes with a lively group of Parisian and international actors, designers, writers, and students. Furthermore, Coggins weaves in fascinating bits of the city's history and artistic lore, from Victor Hugo's interior designs to the painting that legend has it started Impressionism, to delight Francophiles all over. The first edition of Paris in Winter was a Minneapolis Star Tribune top book in 2015 and has been featured in Condé Nast Traveler, Town and Country Magazine, Mpls/StPaul Magazine, and Twin Cities Public Television. With new charming watercolor illustrations featuring loungers gazing over a duck-filled pond and a woman strolling serenely across a bridge with a view of the Eiffel Tower beyond, this second edition book continues to capture the soul of the City of Love.




Paris to the Moon


Book Description

In 1995, Adam Gopnik and his wife, and their infant son left the familiar comforts and hassles of New York for the urbane glamour of Paris. Charmed by the beauties of the city, Gopnik set out to experience for himself the spirit and romance that has so captivated American writers throughout the Twentieth century. In the grand tradition of Stein and Hemingway, Gopnik planned to walk the paths of the Tuilleries, to enjoy philosophical discussion in cafes in short, to lead the fabled life of an American in Paris. Of course, as readers of Gopnik's beloved 'Paris Journals' in the New Yorker know, there was also the matter of raising a child and carrying on with everyday, not so fabled life. Evenings with French intellectuals precede middle-of-the night baby feedings; afternoons are filled with trips to the Musee d'Orsay and pinball games; weekday leftovers are eaten while three star chefs debate a 'culinary crisis'. With singular wit and insight, Gopnik manages to weave the magical with the mundane in a wholly delightful book.