Tuesday, February 14, 2017

Tuesday Intro -- Letters from Paris


Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I wrote about this book Letters from Paris by Juliet Blackwell for Dreaming of France on Monday, so I thought I'd share the intro today. The book goes back and forth in time from Claire Broussard who grew up in Louisiana and travels to Paris after the death of her grandmother who raised her. She's
trying to track down the artists who make masks like the one she found in her attic as a child, and the mask might be connected to her own history. The book jumps back in time to 1897 to tell the story of Sabine, a young French woman who travels to Paris in hopes of finding work.

Here's the intro from the prologue:
February 27, 1898
He sleeps.
Sabine creeps across the dark studio before dawn, beseeching the silent faces not to betray her. They watch her every move, mute witnesses to her crime.
Slipping through the door, she winces at the scraping sound of metal on metal as she pauses to latch it behind her. Fog envelops her,, the mist cutting through her threadbare blouse and underthings, wet needles of cold air piercing her skin. 
  I'm also joining in with Teaser Tuesday which is a weekly bookish meme, hosted Ambrosia @The Purple Booker.
Here's my teaser from page 65:
Claire's stomach growled again. And knock her over with a feather: there was a McDonald's. Right there on the Champs-Elysees.
If that wasn't a sign, she didn't know what was. Claire ducked into the fast-food restaurant. 
I don't know about you, but I'm a little put off by an American who eats at McDonalds when in France. We did it when we traveled with the kids, but I would have to be super homesick pass up French restaurants and cafes to eat at McDonalds.
Here are the kids outside a McDonalds as we drove through France. 
Hope everyone is reading something good.

5 comments:

our life in france said...

Lovely blog as usual,x

(Diane) Bibliophile By the Sea said...

That intro leaves me puzzled. I can't say I love the writing either -- sorry. I like that picture of you in 2015.

Paulita said...

Thanks, Roz.
Diane, I went back to the intro to see what puzzled you. I guess I wondered at the beginning of the book too. I later learned the silent faces are porcelain masks.

Kiwi said...

Now reading "Z" - a novel about Zelda Fitzgerald, the often misunderstood wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald. It's a very believable character study of the two of them from Zelda's point of view, weaving in many of the luminaries of the 1920's literary and theatrical sets. This Zelda does not like Scott's friend Hemingway!

Kiwi said...

Forgot to name the author of "Z!" She is Therese Anne Fowler.

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