Francophilia from Faundance
Explore Faundance's Francophilia book list—curated reads for French culture lovers. Discover the best books to fuel your passion for France!
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Suite Francaise
by Irene Nemirovsky
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The remarkable story of men and women thrown together in circumstances beyond their control during World War II—a heartrending "portrait of a small French town under seige, and the people trying to survive, even to live, as Hitler’s horrors march closer and closer to their doors" (New York). “Stunning.... A tour de force.” —The New York Times Book Review Beginning in Paris on the eve of the Nazi occupation in 1940, as Parisians flee the city, human folly surfaces in every imaginable way: a wealthy mother searches for sweets in a town without food; a couple is terrified at the thought of losing their jobs, even as their world begins to fall apart. Moving on to a provincial village now occupied by German soldiers, the locals must learn to coexist with the enemy—in their town, their homes, even in their hearts. When Irène Némirovsky began working on Suite Française, she was already a highly successful writer living in Paris. But she was also a Jew, and in 1942 she was arrested and deported to Auschwitz, where she died. For sixty-four years, this novel remained hidden and unknown.
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Fire in the Blood
by Irn̈e Nm̌irovsky
A novel about rural life in France during the Nazi occupation.
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Petite Anglaise
by Catherine Sanderson
A young expat Englishwoman in Paris, juggling a dying romance and the demands of motherhood, discovers escape, excitement, and--possibly--true love when she reinvents herself with a click of the mouse.--From publisher description.
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Le Divorce
by Diane Johnson
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST "If one were to cross Jane Austen and Henry James, the result would be Diane Johnson."—San Francisco Chronicle The national bestseller and inspiration for the major motion picture starring Naomi Watts and Kate Hudson! Called "stylish... refreshing... genuinely wise” by The New York Times Book Review,this delightful comedy of manners and morals, money, marriage, and murder follows smart, sexy, and impeccably dressed American Isabel Walker as she lands in Paris to visit her stepsister Roxy, a poet whose marriage to an aristocratic French painter has assured her a coveted place in Parisian society—until her husband leaves her for the wife of an American lawyer. Could "le divorce" be far behind? Can irrepressible Isabel keep her perspective (and her love life) intact as cultures and human passions collide? "Social comedy at its best" (Los Angeles Times Book Review), Le Divorce is Diane Johnson at her most scintillating and sublime.
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Lydia Cassatt Reading the Morning Paper
by Harriet Scott Chessman
The life of impressionist painter Mary Cassatt is fictionalized in this novel about art and passion, narrated by the artist's sister, Lydia.
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The Elegance of the Hedgehog
by Muriel Barbery
The lives of fifty-four-year-old concierge Rene Michel and extremely bright, suicidal twelve-year-old Paloma Josse are transformed by the arrival of a new tenant, Kakuro Ozu.
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Pictures at an Exhibition
by Sara Houghteling
In the wake of World War II, Max Berenzon, the son of an art dealer and his pianist wife, wanders Paris in an effort to recover his family's lost masterpieces, looted by the Nazis during occupation, uncovering in the process stories about the heroism of Rose, his father's beautiful gallery aide, the disappearance of his closest friend, and an old family secret. A first novel. 40,000 first printing.
