Six Novels Worth Your Time Set (at least partly) in Paris
I recently returned from a trip to Paris that I took with my mom and sister-in-law. I had been to Paris several times before, but the city never ceases to inspire me. I am certainly not alone in feeling the inspiration, so I thought I would share some of my favorite books set (at least partly) in Paris. Some are classics that I first read as a student, some are newer releases, and others are classics that I only got around to reading as an adult. I promise you that if it made the list, I think it is worth your time.
The Paris Wife by Paula McLain
Hadley Richardson is a twenty-eight year old living in 1920s Chicago who has all but given up on love when she meets Ernest Hemingway. Following a whirlwind romance, they move to Paris together, where they become entwined in the “Lost Generation” including Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Though deeply in love, they find they are no match for the hard, fast living of Jazz Age Paris. They eventually face a deception and marriage crisis that will lead to the unraveling of everything they’ve worked so hard to build.
This is one of those novels that has stayed and will always stay with me after reading it. It is great for fans of Hemingway and Fitzgerald, as well as for any woman who has dealt with love, betrayal, and torn loyalty. I truly cannot recommend this book more.
Grab your copy here.
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
Les Miserables is a true classic in the world of literature. It is grand in scope, deeply moving, and filled with all the strife, agony, and love of characters who find themselves fighting against the impossible circumstances they found themselves in. You may be familiar with the musical and/or the movie, so I will spare you the plot description here. I have known all the words to the musical by heart since I was six years old, and I still found more to learn and love about this novel when I got around to reading it. It is worth the read even if you already know the story. This is a long one, so I recommend saving it for a time when you have a bit more free time on your hands.
Grab your copy here.
After reading, I highly recommend the PBS Masterpiece miniseries of Les Miserables starring Dominic West as Jean Valjean.
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
This beautiful book tells the story of Marie-Laure, who at six years old goes blind while living in Paris with her father, who works at the Museum of Natural History, where he is the master of its thousands of locks. He then builds her a miniature model of the city, and he teaches her to use it to memorize the entire layout of Paris so that she can always find her way home on her own. When she is twelve years old, the Nazis occupy Paris. Marie-Laure flees with her father to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where her uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. They carry with them what might be the museum’s most valuable jewel.
In a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments, a talent that wins him a place at a brutal academy for Hitler Youth, then a special assignment to track the Resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of the war and, finally, into Saint-Malo, where his story and Marie-Laure’s converge.
Doerr masterfully intertwines the two character’s tales, leaving the reader with a sense of awe over the ways seemingly small moments in our lives can lead to impossible feats later on. This is a hopeful story filled with all the darkness the world can throw at someone, and proving that love truly can conquer all.
Grab your copy here.
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
A Tale of Two Cities is my personal favorite book of all time. I first read it sophomore year of high school, and I have reread it many times since. The novel tells the story of the French Doctor Manette, his 18-year-long imprisonment in the Bastille in Paris and his release to live in London with his daughter Lucie, whom he had never met. The story is set against the conditions that led up to the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror.
I love this story for its intricate plot and detailed descriptions of London and Paris during this time period, but I mostly love it for its characters. It may sound silly to say that I fell in love with Sydney Carton at sixteen years old, but I did. And I love him still. This story is filled with love, hate, deception, honor, bravery, and self-sacrifice. It is epic in scope and very worth the read. It is considered one of the best selling novels of all time, and there are themes and scenes in the book that feel as relevant today as they did two hundred years ago.
Grab your copy here.
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
Renee is the concierge at an elegant Parisian apartment building who spends her time scrutinizing the lives of its well-to-do (and often vacuous) tenants. They all see her as a plump, cantankerous old woman who is addicted to TV. Inwardly, she is a sophisticated aficionado of art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture.
Paloma is a twelve year old tenant in the building who, being convinced of the meaninglessness of life, has decided to end hers on her thirteenth birthday.
Paloma and Renée hide both their true talents and their finest qualities from a world they suspect will not appreciate them. The arrival in the building of a wealthy Japanese tenant changes a delicate and fragile equilibrium.
I found this book very thought-provoking. It challenged me, and I always appreciate when a book does that. It is a bittersweet story about love.
Grab your copy here.
The Nightingaleby Kristin Hannah
The Nightingale is another one of my all time favorite books. Kristin Hannah is a master of stories with epic scope and proportion, and this one does not disappoint.
In the quiet village of Carriveau, Vianne Mauriac says goodbye to her husband, Antoine, as he heads for the Front. She doesn't believe that the Nazis will invade France … but invade they do, in droves of marching soldiers, in caravans of trucks and tanks, in planes that fill the skies and drop bombs upon the innocent. When a German captain requisitions Vianne's home, she and her daughter must live with the enemy or lose everything. Without food or money or hope, as danger escalates all around them, she is forced to make one impossible choice after another to keep her family alive.
Vianne's sister, Isabelle, is a rebellious eighteen-year-old girl, searching for purpose with all the reckless passion of youth. While thousands of Parisians march into the unknown terrors of war, she meets Gäetan, a partisan who believes the French can fight the Nazis from within France, and she falls in love as only the young can … completely. But when he betrays her, Isabelle joins the Resistance and never looks back, risking her life time and again to save others.
The contrast between Vianne and Isabelle as individuals and in the way they experience the war is something that stayed with me long after reading. I love the way that Kristin Hannah illuminates the women’s war in this novel. It is a heartbreaking, haunting, and rich story of love, loss, and redemption.
I highly recommend it.
Grab your copy here.
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