A place in Paris is a pedestrian walking area, like a square or large patio. Sometimes a place is hard to get to, such as the Place Charles de Gaulle at the Arc de Triomphe, which you enter and exit through an underground passage. France’s Tombe du soldat inconnu (Tomb of the Unknown Soldier) contains the remains [...]
My list of adult fiction set in Paris continues here. Where possible, I’ve listed the publication date of the book.
JAMES, Henry. The Ambassadors.
JOHNSON, Diane. Le Divorce (1997), L’Affaire, and Le Mariage (2000).
KOEN, Karleen. Through a Glass Darkly (1987). Caution: there is another book by the same title by Gaardner and the film by Ingmar Bergman.
KRANTZ, Judith. [...]
I’ve compiled a list of adult fiction books set in Paris from information from book clubs, publishers’ lists, book blogs, and my own reading. These are alphabetized by the author’s last name. I haven’t separated them into genres, nor do I sort the books as great or ho-hum or truly awful. When possible, I’ve indicated the original publication [...]
Ernest Hemingway wrote that you carry memories of Paris with you as a moveable feast. But a moveable feast can bring on ants, thunderstorms, food poisoning, and other realities. Living in the French capital is sometimes that kind of difficult picnic.
All this walking kills your feet. Tourists walk for hours a day. Even if you take the metro, you [...]
I recently took Les Cars Rouges (a get-on-and-off red tourist bus with open seating on top) to the Eiffel Tower. My first move was to consume the best ham-and-cheese crepe in Paris at a street stand (see crepe preparation below). The crepe master pours the batter onto a circular black griddle and evens it out dragging a special T-shaped [...]
Cafe de Flore and Les Deux Magots are famous because of who used to consume food and drink there. Long-gone waiters at these cafes served up libations to Breton, Hemingway, Picasso, Camus, Sartre, and de Beauvoir. The cafes now attract lots of tourists and many philosophy and English majors. I even saw an editor soliciting work outside Deux Magots with manuscripts spread [...]
A chilly morning near a Parisian monument in the Latin Quarter, and I’m talking with my ghost.
It was 36 years ago on the steps of the Pantheon that I took a life turn. Arriving on one-way tickets in Paris, my California boyfriend was escaping the Vietnam draft and I was looking for adventure, I guess. At first we’d stayed with [...]
I had been searching for a certain tiny shop at 6, rue d’Echaude in the Latin Quarter for weeks. The shop features items from the not-just-for-children’s book Le Petit Prince. Sadly, the shop has changed idols. Number 6 is now “Pixi & Cie,” featuring books, cards, and dolls of the Belgian comic character Tin Tin. On my recent visit, [...]
I’m not always out and about in Paris. I’m often back at my apartment by late afternoon. I read, write, clean up the place, do a load of wash, and watch TV. My apartment is hooked up to cable, so I get lots of channels. But only five of them are in English. I can enjoy watching “Law and Order” in [...]
And where are the French waitresses?
I had my first rude–or incompetent, or overworked, or poorly trained, or just dumb young male–waiter experience last Sunday afternoon. Otherwise Sunday was perfect with sunny skies, cool temperatures, and no wind. The tourists were out, the mood was festive, and I was winding up my walk in the St. Germain des Pres [...]
