No comments about Lonely Planet Encounter Paris (Encounter).

No comments about Paris.

No comments about Lonely Planet Paris: A City Guide (Lonely Planet Paris).

2 comments about Through the Windows of Paris: Fifty Unique Shops.

1. As a part-time resident of Paris, I thought I knew all of the "bons addresses", those hard-to-find shops where you can find that perfect, unique gift for yourself or someone at home. I was wrong! On my next trip to Paris, I'll be looking into a number of the lovely boutiques mentioned in this book. Not only are the addresses provided, complete with compelling descriptions, but there are gorgeous photos that make your mouth water in anticipation of actually visiting these havens of shopping pleasure, if only to browse and take in the beauty of their wares. Bravo to the authors and photographer!



2. a wonderful book, showing the real character of paris to whet your appetite. as someone who is soon to go to Paris for the first time, i loved this book for doing the legwork for me in finding those little boutiques that add character to your holiday , that i probably would have missed. i'm sure they will lead me to other great little shops and experiences.

5 comments about Our Paris: Sketches from Memory.

1. This is a sweet collection of short pieces, quirky and personal, about a tiny Parisian neighborhood, Paris itself, the French, lots of friends, and a great dog named Fred. Most of all: about Edmund White and his lover Hubert Sorin. Economical yet enjoyably gossipy, kind-hearted, opinionated, informative. Achingly sad, though, because Hubert is dying of AIDS, and in fact does die at the book's end. Definitely worth reading -- especially for fans of Edmund White. Engagingly illustrated by Sorin, who was trained in architecture and took up drawing when he became ill.



2. I love deceptive books.

   Example: _Our Paris_, by Edmund White and Hubert Sorin, is ostensibly a series of short essays, written and illustrated in a fairly direct style, pertaining to life in the city. But in a stunning, disarming preface, White alerts us to the real subtext: his partner's slow death from AIDS. It's this subtext that transforms the book from a pleasant travelogue to a devastating account of loss.

   Lurking beneath the book's shimmering surfaces, and within its numerous lacunae, is the emotional life of a couple threatened by the fast-approaching specter of death. An attentive reading of White's text and Hubert Sorin's illustrations reveals the mauvaise foi, the daily negotiations, the implicit contract of domestic denial that enables an endangered couple to keep death at bay for just a little longer.

   _Our Paris_ looks slight, as if it were merely a pleasant evening's worth of travel anecdotes and gossip. But if you take yourself into this book's confidence, it will reveal unexpected secrets.




3. I picked up this little book for a return flight from Paris to LA. It looked like perfect plane reading -- short, gossipy, topical. And although it lived up to each of those expectations, the devastation implicit in the book (and explicit at the end) hit hard. The book is not easily forgettable -- and probably no less memorable for the passengers and crew of American Airlines flight 45 who watched me become a sniffling, tear-stained disaster.

   It's very intimate, shockingly un-French. White and Sorin invite you into their lives. You feel as if you're at a dinner party listening to them recount(even bicker a little about) their recent mundane adventures. But this intimacy also means that you feel very close to the heartbreaking loss that is the real subject of the book.

   It's a beautiful, touching book. The illustrations complement the text (or the text complements the illustrations) perfectly. But if you want to avoid the mess entirely, try The Flaneur.




4. A delightful book about White and Sorin's life in Paris, with an inevitable undercurrent of sadness, because Sorin is dying. Yet his inability to practice his work as an architect led him to develop the "unique, exuberant drawing style" that illustrates this book.
   
   Here you will meet all sorts of interesting people. The concierge, Madame Denise, and the coiffeuse who tries out all the latest hairstyles on her. Father Pierre Riches, the "kind and elegant" Catholic priest whose hair had been stroked by Cavafy and whose photograph had been taken by Mapplethorpe. Billy Boy, the jewelry designer with 16,000 Barbies (who, tiring of them, invents a doll called Mdvany, a trendy Parisienne who "will not have unlined skirts like certain dolls we could name . . .". PIerre Guyotat, who wrote in a "strange subvocal language of his own devising, one that omitted vowels among other unnecessary luxuries."
   
   And the places in Paris! How nice to live above a bookstore, especially one that revels in the splendidly punny name, Mona Lisait. To write at the Café Beaubourg, where the waiters will be equally attentive to you and your dog, and where the "tabletops were all painted by celebrated French artists but not signed lest they be stolen." To wander the Marais with its delicatessens and seventeenth-century townhouses, its "Kiki Boys" and dogwalkers.
   
   If you have visited Paris, this book will bring back memories. If you haven't, you may find yourself calling a travel agent!



5. Immensely readable, thoroughly enjoyable, and ultimately poignant. White puts it best in his bittersweet, fresh-wound of an afterword: "Despite the catty sound of this book, its name-dropping and archness, I hope at least a few readers will recognize that its subtext is love. Hubert loved me with unwavering devotion . . . I loved him, too, in my cold, stinting, confused way. I wanted to keep him alive as long as possible. This book gave us something to do while waiting for the end."

1 comments about Remembering Paris.

1. The primary reason to purchase this book is the wonderful illustrations. While the narrative is evocative, it is a bit dark for me. None the less, having read this book I would love to visit Paris again to discover the city which Tillinac has so vividly described.

1 comments about Postmark Paris.

1. For lovers of Nick Bantock (Griffin & Sabine,), and Karen Elizabeth Gordon, (Deluxe Trasitive Vampire, and Paris Out of Hand,) this small volume is a time capsule of a young girl's year growing up in Paris. Told via her stamp collection, (1 colorful French stamp and one life-vignette per page,) it traces her year with her family and school friends until the end, when they must leave Paris to come back to the United States.

   Inspires anyone interested in collage, (although there are no collages in the book per se, I loved it anyway,) Parisian life, and stamp collecting.

   The only thing I wanted was more. Where is the author now? How did her stamp collection become this book? Why is this book out of print?? Alas.

5 comments about SmartFrench For Travelers.

1. That object is beautifull as much as it is helpful. I went to the smatfrench website to download the audio recordings of the whole book and I can polish my French phrases before my trip. The book is spiral bound so that when you are at the page of the situation you choose, like the hotel for example, the book stays flat and you can easily put it back in your shirt pocket. What I like also is that each sentence is recorded on a different track, so you can find it in a second. Very cool!



2. I like the color coding. It makes the sentences so easy to pronounce. I have had travel guides but they are generally too thick, with too many sentences and finally unusable. This one is just right.



3. This is an excellent tutorial to learn French. I highly recommend it for anyone who is studying/has studied French and wants to know how to *speak* French. It doesn't include grammar. This you will find elsewhere. SmartFrench, unlike other popular teaching methods, teaches how to listen to the spoken French just as it is used in real conversations. I found it to be a great confidence builder.



4. This is a high end French phrase book built to last. Weatherproof, too. Convenient, smartly laid out, and enjoyable to use. The French is written to show you how to pronounce it as it is actually pronounced by the French. This is its' ultimate selling point. Great product.



5. This book is not as described in the other reviews. It looks like someone just printed it off their computer and laminated it. It does NOT have phonetic pronuciation (just some confusing red/black color coding which is not explained), and the online audio tracks are available only for an additional fee. I returned this book and am going to look elsewhere before my trip to Paris.

1 comments about SUNDAYS BY THE RIVER (Motta Photography Series).

1. On Sundays, Paris comes to a halt and Parisians take time to celebrate, well, that they're Parisians. In the spring and summer, especially, outdoor leisure predominates, and the romantic illusions that we Americans treasure of the City of Lights come closest to being reality.

   At least, that's how this book's Introduction by Noël Simsolo paints it. And I'm inclined to believe him. Certainly, Willy Ronis' very impressive photography seems to support the argument. Or, more precisely, the argument seems to support Ronis' images, since it's the images that this book is about. Ronis is an important and skilled photographer, and the Smithsonian and Motta Editore of Milan have done a fine job in selecting four dozen of his images for this book. They're a great portrayal of Paris at rest. And because the images are monochromatic, the fact that they span four decades (1947 to 1993) can easily be forgotten. Classic Paris always seems to be in black and white anyway, and Ronis' timeless, seductive work draws us in easily.

5 comments about A French Affair: The Paris Beat, 1965-1998.

1. As a 50 year old with a newly found love of Paris and, as a result, a desire to learn French, I bought "A French Affair" because it was recommended as shedding light on what makes the French act, uh, French. If this is the point of the book, then it only partially achieves the goal. A great deal of the book, however, is given to anecdotes about French film makers. Very nice if that's what you're interested in. If your interests are similar to mine, understanding the French, I'd come back to this book later. That being said, some of the articles were very good indeed.



2. Phew... Let me defend this book a little against a couple of odd criticisms. First, this is a collection of essays written over quite a few years. As such, it is not meant to be cohesive in the way a single book about the French might be. That said, it all hangs together quite well and is organized in an intelligent and useful way. It also seems a little odd to make a distinction between a book about "the French" and a book about the French which includes material about French filmmakers, writers, etc. I would think any book about the culture would be incomplete without fairly extensive sections on the arts. The arts are pretty inextricably linked with outsiders perception of the French and, to a large degree, their own perceptions about themselves. The people she talks about are hardly obscure or only of interest to "old people" --- Duras, Simone de Beauvoir, Truffaut, Doisneau for god's sake, whose photos adorn the walls of a hefty percentage of college kids to this day. Duras is a particularly amusing choice for such a book, as she seems more stereotypically "French" than perhaps anyone else in the whole country. Should the reader not know who any of these people are, the essays are written for a wide audience and do not assume knowledge of the subjects. And the style is certainly not coldly intellectual; the writing is intelligent, but quite breezy and very enjoyable.



3. Having lived and worked as an American in Paris for 7 years in the late 80's and early 90's, I really appreciated Ms. Blume's commentaries on the French and evocations of the details of Parisian life that made it so wonderful. She captures the sheer fun of observing and participating in a foreign culture better than any writer on the subject I've read to date. Her empathy for the French despite their quirks - naturally, only quirks when seen by an American - resonates well with my experience. Highly recommended!



4. I have visited France frequently, and am an avid reader of books about France. I loved the title and cover photo on this book, and had great hopes for the book since the writer had reported from Paris for The International Herald Tribune for many years. While the book is well written, I felt that many of the essays failed to connect with the French spirit and joie de vivre. I found some of the writing to be dry and the book slow. Each story was originally an article in the paper, and while they might have worked reading them with the morning coffee, they did not work for me as a collection.

   The book title would lead you to believe that the book is about France, some of the stories take place in other countries and I could not figure out how they ended up in the book. Additionally the last section of the book focuses on a group of European filmmakers that would have worked well as a Filmography, but for my money did not belong in a book of this title.

   Don't get me wrong, there are some interesting and well-written pieces in this book, but you have to trundle through pages that I feel are slow and dated to get to them. If you have not read much about France, I recommend Adam Gopnick's "Paris to The Moon," John Littell's "French Impressions," or for a humorous perspective any of Peter Mayle's "Provence" works. Of course, don't miss the grandfather of all books on France, Hemmingway's "A Moveable Feast."




5. I think A FRENCH AFFAIR will be best appreciated by those who have seen Paris once or twice. Those who have no familiarity with Paris and it's residents may become lost. If you know the difference between Simone de Beauvoir and Simone Signoret you may find the book entertaining.

   If I had not known Mary Blume wrote her Paris beat pieces for the International Herald Tribune, I would have thought they were written for The New Yorker magazine. She wrote tongue-in-cheek stories that begin in the middle and assume the reader already knows a great deal about Paris life. If she pops up in London you don't blink an eyelash because you know it's a day trip to travel from London to Paris, or Paris to anywhere else for that matter since Paris has made itself the travel hub of Europe.

   I read these articles over lunch--spread over a few months. I carried the book in my book bag and broke it out when I needed a little light reading. This is a perfect book for travel because if you put it away and don't look at it for a month you won't loose your train of thought. If you read it straight through it may be as disappointing as reading a week of newspapers.