Nose in a Book

Anonymous asked

Hello, I'm going to Paris this March. Do you have any suggestion on books to read before the trip? And any worth visiting bookshops in Paris apart from the famous Shakespeare & Co.? Thank you very much for your help. :)

In Paris I read Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast, which is his memoir of his early years in Paris. I really enjoyed it and thought it added a lot to being in the city and to my reading experience. The Paris Wife by Paula McLain would also be a good one to read before you go, although it’s also about Hemingway (this time told from the perspective of his first wife in a novel.) If you like YA, I’d read Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins and Just One Day by Gayle Forman. Both are great.
As for bookstores, I only went to Shakespeare & Co, but it’s so busy that it would have been nice to go to another, less famous bookshop. Abbey Bookshop is a Canadian store and near by, and I had a list of some other shops (Tea and Tattered Pages, Red Wheelbarrow Bookstore) but I can’t find very much information to make sure they’re still open, since the links I have are broken. Anyways, I hope you have fun!

headaurorpotter asked

Hello Emma! Lovely to see your pictures of your trip to Paris and London. I wanted to ask if you already read A Moveable Feast. I bought it too, but I've never been to Paris and I've never read Hemingway before. And I read a review that said "you won't understand a thing if you haven't done both". So I was wondering if you thought that was true. Thanks and hugs!

I did finish it and I really liked it! I hadn’t really read much of Hemingway, only An Old Man At Sea (which I didn’t enjoy) and two short stories. I don’t think that you have to have read any of his books or have been to Paris (although it was a really enjoyable book to read in Paris) to enjoy A Moveable Feast It helps if you’re interested in Paris and in some of the writers he mentions, like the Fitzgeralds.

readingwritingraptures asked

In response to the question about WWII books, I thought Pictures at an Exhibition by Sara Houghteling was quite good. It's about the son of a Jewish art dealer in Paris during WWII and deals with the post-war struggle to recover artwork stolen by the Nazis. Thematically, it reminds me a little of Chaim Potok (if Potok wrote about secular Jews in Paris).

Thank you, I’m sure that helps! 

maddythroughthevideoscreen asked

Great review for Just One Day. Yeah the Shakespeare part I did enjoy. But I didn't find the travel as exciting. I loved Paris when I visited, and I just felt that the Gayle just didn't capture that magic I experienced and it disappointed me. But I suppose it's just a person's different interpretation of the city, and I did like the fact that it wasn't how Paris is typically portrayed in books.

Funny, I never fell in love with Paris while I was actually there, but reading Just One Day made me want to go back. Maybe you’d like Anna and the French Kiss.