The Ernest Hemingway Home is so high up on my list of favorite attractions I’ve visited that it just might be at the very top. The beautiful house is on a large, lush space of land that is larger that you’re used to finding in the relatively small town of Key West. And that pool! He also used to have a cat walk that ran from the upper floor of the back porch on the house out to his writing…
Good morning everyone! I am so, so excited that Samantha has included Shelf Quest in the virtual tour of her new book, How to Make a French Family. How to Make A French Family is a delightful follow-up to Seven Letters from Paris (my review here). In this book, Samantha has moved to Cugnaux, a small town in southwestern France with her husband, Jean-Luc, and her stepchildren, Elvire and Max. Moving to a new country, being newly married, and suddenly being a…
Bonjour and welcome to my first Wednesday Whimsy post! I came up with the idea while in Paris, in the middle of the night, unable to sleep, and browsing French and Paris-themed articles. I have a lot of blogs, instagram accounts, movies, books, and online reads I regularly turn to or search out and thought I’d create a space to share all the good stuff. Originally I thought it would be a “French Friday” sort of thing but I found…
I had a lot of unsure feelings about The Bone Witch while reading it. I don’t love reading fantasy books set in a completely new world; it’s hard for me to have an anchor to them, something that connects me to and keeps me in that world. Too often authors describe the world as though what we should see is familiar, rather than it being described by an outsider that we can relate to. I did have a hard time…
In my defense, it was a trip for my 30th birthday. Oops, did I say that out loud? Originally I was thinking of going to Disneyland in California but then decided it wasn’t quite big enough for the big 3-0. I did a little research on flights to Paris and found some via Icelandair for $600 per person round trip and got Joe on board. We found an affordable Airbnb (the studio we stayed in is here) and suddenly my dream…
This is one of the most disappointing and most misleading books I have read in a very long time. Actually, I don’t think I have ever been so mislead by a book before. The full title is Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London but very little of the book is actually about the art of walking. Really, this book is a history of several women writer’s lives of the past with a mishmash of topics thrown in…
When I started A Homemade Life, I was a little disappointed. It is laid out as a short (around 3 pages) essay/story with a recipe or two to follow. Rinse and repeat. The first few were okay, but I had been hoping for something more like another book of hers I read, Delancy. However, a few stories in I changed my mind. Molly has such a charming way of writing that it makes me want to be a better writer…
Romancing the Inventor is a novella involving one of my very favorite parasol protectorate/parasolverse characters: Madame Lefoux! In it you will find an almost-200 page dose of my favorite author and all the wit and humor that comes along with her books. I truly adore each one of them. The book takes place post-Parasol Protectorate when Genevieve is serving her indenture with Countess Nadasdy. Imogene accepts a position in the hive house as a parlourmaid. There is an obvious attraction…
Ever since a few good friends took me to Din Thai Fung a few years ago, I’ve been pretty head-over-heels for dim sum. My co-worker and I love to take management visiting from our home office there for lunch when they’re in town and I love to see new locations popping up all over the Seattle area. The Dim Sum Field Guide seems to be a pretty extensive (at least to my little American brain) collection of the types of food…
When reading one of Charlaine Harris’s mystery series earlier last year, my eyes fell on a perfect description for what this type of story is… a “southern domestic cozy” mixed with magical realism. It makes me feel like I immediately have to move to a small town and always have baked goods and sweet tea ready for any surprise guests. This is the third book in the Obituary Society series and I just have to say that I really really…