Janice MacLeod's Blog, page 14

So I’m inside a stationery shop in Paris. Christophe is standing outside with Amélie because the stroller won’t fit in the store. This is a big issue in Paris. Teeny tiny lanes inside stores of breakables make the nostrils of Parisian cashiers flare even more than normal. This is what Paris looks like to me:

There they are, walking ahead slowly while I take yet another photo. And…

They both don’t like waiting. They also don’t like waiting outside stores. They basically just put up with me.

So they are waiting outside the stationery shop.

I don’t have a lot of time. The shop is good and so full of beautiful PAPER. I’m such a paper nerd. I can deliberate far too long in front of a wall of cards and envelopes. But this time, I don’t have time to mull so I just buy everything I grab on my first tour of the store. I spend way too much cash on a bunch of pretty paper. I feel slight guilt in the moment, but after I come home I spread it all out over the bed and relished in the glory of pretty paper. So nice! I am like Sharon Stone in Casino…

But instead of jewels it is paper.

As I survey the paper, I come to three realizations:

The folder the paper is in can be just as delightful. Stationery sets are much more fun to have when you can slowly open the clasp to pull out your stationery.


Having a collection of cards rather than many copies of the same card was much more fun for sorting and deciding which of my pen pals would get which card.


Having pretty envelopes to go along with the note cards elevates the whole situation. I was floored by how many stationery sets had boring plain envelopes… like they didn’t think it through. But when the envelopes were nice, I relished the idea of addressing them to friends and family.

But not one of my stationery sets have all three elements. So that’s when I huff, puff and declare to the world, “I’m making my own stationery sets!” And that’s what I do. Thus far, I have two darling stationery sets in my shop.

The Paris Streets Collection:

Not surprising given my delight in painting Paris street scenes for the ol’ Paris Letters. Notice the orange envelope. It’s called Tangerine. How delicious.

The Paris Post Collection:

Also not surprising given my delight in all things philatelic. This collection is based on the postcards I found at flea markets around Paris. The penmanship of yesteryear France makes my teeth tingle.

I’ve got a few other collections in the works, but they require a deeper delve into font research. Speaking of, I received a fan letter the other day…

J’aime your book. Okay, my French is abysmal… I just got your book: A Paris Year, and absolutely love it! My question to you is this: what typeface did you, or your graphic designer/publisher use? It looks like it’s handwritten, but clearly, it is not. I love it. At any rate, it is such a fantastic book/work/journal/sketchbook. Bravo to you!

My reply…

The search for the perfect font is a long, arduous journey. And I’m the graphic designer of the book as well as the writer so you know I was a control freak about the whole thing. There are three fonts, The body copy is called MaryDale (I used the alternate stylistic set that substitutes a few less quirky letter forms. The original lowercase “g” was driving me crazy.). The headlines are Tuesday Script with the occasional Bruselo capital letter tossed in here and there for flare.

Some of the postcards I found that day became the note cards I posted on my shop today. Funny how life works.

So my love/neurosis about stationery is matched only by my love/neurosis of fonts. This is why it takes so long to design a project… oh, and this…


So glad I organized all those diapers.

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Boy oh boy. Having a new baby and new book makes for a backlog of… well, everything else. The lovely Amélie has provided me with a BONUS early evening nap so I can share the latest news happening over here at Paris Letters Headquarters.

First, the latest bunch of letters, now available in the shop:

Seems I can’t stop writing about Shakespeare & Company, that famous little English bookstore on the left side of the Seine. I think this is my fifth letter about this place. The most recent letter is about the most recent café they opened next door. Be still my heart.

Believe it or not, the famous Paris ice cream shop Berthillon closes in summer. They need vacation just like the rest of the city. So this letter is about that.

(Remember when I had all the time in the world and I was eloquent in my blog posts? Ya, I think we should accept that eloquence won’t return until kindergarten arrives.)

This letter is about a tobacco shop in Paris. For a long time I didn’t venture into these places because I didn’t need cigarettes, but some of them are oh so lovely in the back. A great place to hide out and write eloquently.

In other news, A Paris Year made it to #1 in the travel section of the biggest bookstore in Australia so THANKS AUSTRALIA! And it keeps bouncing near the top of the charts over in the Amazon world. What I like best about all this book business is the kind words from friends who I know don’t read books but have been loving A Paris Year. And Instagram has been all a-Twitter. So to speak.

This one is from Tranquility du Jour. We did a podcast episode recently. Coming out in August. And pocketfullofglitter outdid herself with the blankie…

And inthevintagekitchen outdid herself both with her photo…

And the corresponding blog post, which is about how some people can’t quit Paris. And I am definitely one of these people. Is it an obsession? Nah. It just feels like home… a really wonderful place to hang out. Speaking of wonderful places to hang out, I hear someone stirring… à bientôt!

Here I am standing in front of the Paris Opéra that I painted, not realizing that it would grace the cover of A PARIS YEAR, my new book that came out TODAY.

Launch Day for an author is a Big. Fat. Deal. It’s the day when all the pre-orders become all the sold orders for this one day. Hopefully that catapults a book to super stardom, and I’m happy to say that of all the books on France on Amazon, this one landed here:

And that pole position of #1, my friend, is because of YOU. Unless you didn’t pre-order the book, but you still have time… until the end of this day, June 20th. Then any sale after this day is very good but not AS GOOD.

Also after this day I will quit begging you to buy the book already. But until midnight, I’d like to remind you that it makes a great Christmas present, even though it’s June and I’m sweating in my sundress as we consider winter gift giving.

Remember back when I was writing this book and announced the other big project I was working on?

Now look at her:

Imbibing with mommy.

Perhaps this is a better view:

Imbibing with daddy.

Speaking of daddy, she learned how to blow kisses on Father’s Day. How cute is that? And today, big launch day, she has given mommy the gift of an extra long nap so I can send out this Launch Day message to you:

Thanks for buying the book you wonderful human.

And if you haven’t bought the book yet, please for the love of Dieu, do it today. Here’s a handy list of where you can buy the book.

The lovely Susan Blumberg-Kason, author of Good Chinese Wife made A PARIS YEAR her Book of the Week.Thanks Susan.

And thank you once again for making A PARIS YEAR a success. And for showing up here to read all about it.

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Paris, the City of Light becomes the City of Stairs once you have a baby. The Métro is the biggest challenge. No elevators, rarely an escalator, plus a heavy stroller filled with urban exploring supplies, not to mention the baby. It’s enough to make a person huff before even taking the first step. But when you live in Paris, you’re not huffing it to the Eiffel Tower every day, and if I were to go to the Eiffel Tower, I’d be taking Uber.

There was a time when I would feel guilty for even taking the Métro or the bus, thinking I should be walking everywhere lest I miss a chance to photograph the latest cat art around town:

But being a mother makes an urban explorer adjust her expectations. Strolls are more local, I pack a picnic blanket, I take the friggin’ taxi. Otherwise I just get angry and flustered, which rubs off on the lovely Amélie. She’s a good little traveler. She likes stopping for coffee and is patient when I do photo shoots with the new book.

By the way, the book launches June 20th, so if you’re thinking of buying a copy for you and yours, it helps your humble author more to buy on or before the launch day… one of those statistical plays that helps climb your book to the top of the charts. Here’s a handy list of places to buy your book. I’ve also included a signed copy option over at my Etsy shop because a few friends asked for it, so why not. They are doing their Christmas shopping early and I’m happy to oblige while I’m hanging out close to home with this good little French girl:

 

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Rarely do I come across a book that actually inspires me to alter my own style of writing in a dramatic way. But In Other Words" target="_blank">In Other Words did just that.

There are no spoilers here, so you can read on.

It’s bothersome when someone reviews a book and tells you too much. All I will tell you about is the first chapter, which you can In Other Words">download free over at Amazon if you’d like.

This book is about an American woman studying Italian. In the first chapter, she equates learning the new language to the desire to swim to the other side of a lake.

“For twenty years I studied Italian as if I were swimming along the edge of that lake. Always next to my dominate language, English. Always hugging that shore. It was good exercise. Beneficial for the muscles, for the brain, but not very exciting. If you study a foreign language that way, you won’t drown. The other language is always there to support you, to save you. But you can’t float without the possibility of drowning, of sinking. To know a new language, to immerse yourself, you have to leave the shore. Without a life vest. Without depending on solid ground.”

If you’ve ever studied another language, you understand.

She goes on to talk about taking her Italian dictionary with her to Italy:

“It becomes both a map and a compass, and without it I know I’d be lost. It becomes a kind of authoritative parent, without whom I can’t go out.”

And on the day in Rome when she realizes she left the dictionary at home and didn’t need it:

“I’m aware of a turning point. A sense of freedom and, at the same time, of loss. Of having grown up, at least a little.”

So good!

Even now, after speaking with Christophe for five years in French, I turn on the French TV channel and feel despair that I’ll never easily understand French like I do with English.

When you first begin learning a language, you have total enthusiasm. “I’m getting it! I can say hello, goodbye, please and thank you. I’m nearly bilingual!” Then you visit the country of the language you’re studying and you’re beaten down by an entire language made up of mumbo jumbo.

It’s like standing at a locked glass door.

You can see a whole world on the other side but you can’t get there.

My first fling with studying Italian was through Michel Thomas’ Italian Language course. Then I stumbled through the language row at the library. They were all good and bad for their own reasons. The only course that held any enthusiasm was Coffee Break Italian from Radio Lingua.

It’s conversational tone keeps me going. It’s PDFs and videos work. And I’m not getting any affiliate cash to say any of this. I just like it and want to share.

I’ve been revisiting my French studies now, too. And I had a dream last night that I spoke French to a Polish relative. She was looking at me like she understood everything I was saying… a skill mastered by expats everywhere. But she didn’t realize I wasn’t speaking English. My French accent was THAT BAD.

So it’s a process.

Anyway, if you plan on a road trip though the lavender fields of Provence, or think the beach of the Sorrento is in your near future, Coffee Break Italian or Coffee Break French might be worth trying out. Their podcast is generous with information and you can upgrade for a more robust experience.

In other news:

You’ve got 1 day to enter to win one of five copies of A PARIS YEAR over at Goodreads. That’s May 10th. Open to USA residents only. Sorry rest of the world. Don’t feel bad. I couldn’t enter either. But this means you don’t have Trump as President. Sorry other half of the USA.

You can pre-order A PARIS YEAR now and it will arrive at your doorstep around June 20th. (Pre-ordering is a great way to take care of those Christmas gifts early… plus it helps your humble author mightily.) It has a textured hard cover, gold inlay and sweet vibrant colour pages throughout. Check out the Fliptastic video over at Instagram.

Nice words from nice people about A PARIS YEAR:

“A Paris Year is the kind of beautiful book you want to hug against your chest.” —Samantha Verant, author of Seven Letters from Paris and How to Make a French Family

“Janice’s journey of a year in Paris is downright magical. A wonderful read!” –Lindsey Tramuta, journalist and author of The New Paris

“As much a treat for the eyes as for the soul. A Paris Year is a must for anyone who loves Paris.” –Lisa Anselmo, author of My (Part-Time) Paris Life: How Running Away Brought Me Home

Aw shucks. Thanks y’all. Pre-order at your fave book seller.

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She had me at “Coffee?”

I’ve just spent a glorious week reading The New Paris: The People, Places & Ideas Fueling a Movement by Lindsey Tramuta, and my bucket list for Things to Do in Paris is longer than ever. This book is so great!

You may remember Lindsey from this post where she interviewed me on my Paris Letters for her blog Lost In Cheeseland. I remember the day well. It was a sweltering summer day in Paris. I had just popped my head out of the stifling Métro to take a breath of fresh air, but instead inhaled more heat and humidity. I was sweating in places I didn’t know I could sweat.

We met at Boot Café in the Haut Marais. She ordered an iced coffee. As the sweat dripped down my back, I decided to do the same. And the coffee was really, really good.

I had become so accustomed to drinking swill in Paris that I had forgotten that some places serve wonderful coffee. And this tiny tale illustrates what The New Paris is all about.

The fresh-faced Lindsey has spent the last few years seeking out a new wave of Paris-based artists who are adding a bright new energy and creativity to food, wine, pastry, coffee, beer, fashion, and design. She collected her discoveries (and stories behind the discoveries) in this new gorgeous book, which has the famed Boot Café on the cover. Nice touch!

Since the Midnight in Paris version of the city is so hypnotic to tourists, brasseries and cafés have been hesitant to evolve. They have relied on ambiance and the romantic ideas of sitting and lingering with a journal (for which I myself am guilty), and have forgotten that products they are selling are substandard and falling behind.

Lindsey explains:

“The trouble with such an internationally fetishized public image… is that the city becomes a prisoner to its own deified history, hemmed in by its former successes. Few tourist cities have the weight of such an image and heritage to shoulder. So to protect its legendary reputation, the city has historically turned inward and resisted change…. As other world capitals garnered attention in the media for innovations in technology, business, and even the culinary arts, Paris’s image as change-phobic and voluntarily disconnected from the global world was cemented even further. Mediocrity (or a bad case of resting on their laurels) in many areas of life, from gastronomy to business and tourism, had become the accepted norm—why mess with something that works?”

Some of this wasn’t entirely the city’s fault. The economic crisis of 2008 had small-business owners flailing. The world had decided on “staycations.” No one came to Paris. There was a collective nervous gulp. Many businesses had to cut back on quality to keep the bottom line from sinking. This meant purchasing from wholesale giants, using frozen ingredients, and pre-made dishes. Though the crisis is now over, some of those cost-cutting practices remain.

I’ve also noticed this low quality when touring people around Paris. We inevitably stop at a very Paris-y looking bistro. Most order the three course menu of French onion soup, boeuf bourguignon, and crème brûlée. These three items were on their Paris bucket list, and bistros are happy to comply. The onion soup barely has a sprinkling of cheese and needs a hefty dose of salt, the stew is a joke, and the crème brûlée is the same quality found at the regular grocery store (but quadruple in price). The tourists smile, savor each bite, and marvel at the glorious cuisine. 

And I’m looking at them with my brow arched thinking, “Are you serious?”

My tourists are so set on this idea that food in Paris is wonderful that they can’t actually taste how bad it can be.

But the good stuff is there. You just need to know where to look, and that’s where The New Paris comes in. I had already been to some places mentioned in the book, but was led to them through word of mouth. This impeccably researched book will lead you to the artists who are daring to evolve the realms of gastronomy, design, fashion, and (speaking from personal experience), coffee. Plus, the book has gorgeous photos of Paris, taken by the talented Charissa Fay.

As I read, I kept wondering why this book hadn’t been written yet. I suppose, like the artists mentioned in its pages, it takes a daring dreamer to take the first step. Why write about the new when people are buying into the old? Bravo brave Madame Tramuta! It’s a masterpiece.

Perhaps one day, you’ll find yourself in a Paris café she mentions in the book. Perhaps you’ll be wishing you were in Midnight in Paris, but with one sip of great coffee, you’ll be glad to be in the new Paris. It’s now available as of April 18th. Buy yours pronto.

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It’s really true. Elizabeth Bard really does reveal secrets of French dining in her new book Dinner Chez Moi: 50 French Secrets to Joyful Eating and Entertaining. It’s not just a hip and seductive tagline. Here are five secrets that popped out at me as I was flipping though this new glorious (and helpful) cookbook:

Secret #3: Salad dressing? It takes less that a minute to whip up your own vinaigrette in the bottom of the salad bowl. Toss it with greens from bottom up so they don’t get too soppy and wet. “French vinaigrette is like your favorite lip gloss; it should add the merest shimmer of flavor.”

Secret #9: Cinnamon in savory dishes. “Like wearing a red bra under your business suit, it changes everything, even though you might be the only one who knows it’s there.”

Secret #20: Anchovies. Just trust me here.

Secret #29: Le Creuset Dutch oven means a few minutes of prep, then several hours in the oven… and a meal that makes you seem like you cooked for those several hours.

Secret #30: Want creamy soup? Don’t use cream. Use an immersion blender. “I’m a low-tech cook. I don’t have razor-sharp knives, a KitchenAid, or a Vitamix, and it takes me longer to retrieve, put together, and wash my food processor than it does to chop five pounds of onions by hand.”

Genius!

And there are 45 more wonderful tips and tricks. If you’re looking for a little more je ne sais quoi in your kitchen, pick up Dinner Chez Moi. Now, I’m getting back to my anchovy-laden salad. Yumbo.

For many of us, the idea of living in France is dreamy. Life is filled with vibrant markets full of wicker baskets of cherries, bouquets of lavender, and neat stacks of multicoloured radishes. The afternoons stretch into rose-coloured evenings filled with endless glasses of wine and the laughter of friends in the local bistro.

Is it really like that?

Yes, it is.

And no, it isn’t. Life in France is also filled with linguistic flubs, cultural faux pas, and basic stuff like getting the kids off to school and trying to make new friends. Samantha Vérant tells us about the good, bad, and bitter in her new book How to Make a French Family.

You may remember her from this book:

In Seven Letters from Paris, she tells about how she fell in love with a French rocket scientist (!!!) on a whirlwind trip to Paris. After she returned home, he promptly sent her seven love letters which she ignored. Oh youth! Years later she rediscovered the letters, looked him up, and reconnected with him. The new book How to Make a French Family is what happens after their happily ever after. Here’s the summary:

Take one French widower, his two young children, and drop a former city girl from Chicago into a small town in southwestern France. Shake vigorously… and voilà: a blended Franco-American family whose lives will all drastically change.

Floating on a cloud of newlywed bliss, Samantha couldn’t wait to move to France to begin her life with her new husband, Jean-Luc, and his kids. But almost from the moment the plane touches down, Samantha realizes that there are a lot of things about her new home―including flea-ridden cats, grumpy teenagers, and language barriers―that she hadn’t counted on.

Struggling to feel at home and wondering when exactly her French fairy tale is going to start, Samantha isn’t sure if she really has what it takes to make it in la belle France. But when a second chance at life and love is on the line, giving up isn’t an option. How to Make a French Family is the heartwarming and sometimes hilarious story of the culture clashes and faux pas that , in the end, add up to one happy family.

In the book, she includes recipes and tender moments of her struggles to adapt to her new life in the south of France. For me, I’m not reading for the recipes. I’m reading because over the years I’ve gotten to know Samantha and she is a genuinely kind person. She is super supportive of myself and other France-themed authors, she’s enthusiastic about sharing our projects, and she’s just a great gal that I’m happy to call a friend.

I get warm fuzzies when I think of Samantha. You will too when you read How to Make a French Family. And anyone how includes a kitty in their author photo is already going to get my vote:

Good kitty. As you likely know from me going on about pre-ordering my new book, A Paris Year, if you buy it today (her launch day) you help the author tremendously. Much more than buying it next week. Something about stats and Amazon and the machine behind the machine. Get her new book here.

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Anthony Bourdain is one of those guys you don’t want to love. He’s got this dick-ish way of being that scares happy-light-friendly ladies like me. And yet, I cannot help but nod in agreement with so much of what he says. Recently, wealthsimple came out with an article on Anthony Bourdain and his view on finances. There I was nodding again. A few genius quotes from the article:

Anthony on debt:

“I am fanatical about not owing anybody any money. I hate it. I don’t want to carry a balance, ever. I have a mortgage, but I despise the idea. That was my biggest objection to buying property, though I wasn’t in the position to pay cash.”

Anthony on making big bucks:

“To me, money is freedom from insecurity, freedom to move, time if you choose to make use of time.”

Anthony on paying taxes:

“Nobody likes paying high taxes, but I don’t mind. Maybe that’s a luxury, but I don’t need to hire some hotshot to spend 12 hours a day figuring out how to chisel the government out of an extra few thousand dollars. If getting that extra money means a lot of phone calls and talking to financial analysts and lawyers, I don’t want it. I don’t want to have those conversations.”

And that’s just one article. If you’ve been following along as long as I have, you find some real gems spewed out of his gorgeous pie hole…

Anthony on Detroit:

“I love Detroit. I love Detroiters. You’ve got to have a sense of humor to live in a city so relentlessly fucked. You’ve got to be tough—and occasionally even devious. And Detroiters are funny, tough—and supreme improvisers. They are also among the best and most fun drinkers in the country.”

Anthony on Ina Garten:

“I love Ina Garten. She’s one of the few people on Food Network who can actually cook. When Ina Garten roasts a chicken, she roasts it correct. When Ina Garten makes mashed potatoes, those are some solid mashed potatoes. In many ways I want Ina’s life. I don’t want to live in her house. I don’t want to spend a weekend there. It gets weird in Ina Land . . . Oh, when Jeffrey gets home, he’ll be so happy I made meatloaf. And then he comes home and you’re pretty sure he’s not into meatloaf.”

Anthony on cheese:

“You have to be a romantic to invest yourself, your money, and your time in cheese.”

Anthony on retirement:

“I’m definitely looking forward to the day when I stop working ­– if I ever stop working. I like the idea of keeling over in my tomato vines in Sardinia or northern Italy.”

Anthony on Russia:

“On Vladimir Putin: “Russians love him. They seem to feel about him how New Yorkers used to feel about Giuliani: He may be a son of a b#@ch, but he’s our son of a b#@ch.”

Anthony on parenting:

“We know, for instance, that there is a direct, inverse relationship between frequency of family meals and social problems. Bluntly stated, members of families who eat together regularly are statistically less likely to stick up liquor stores, blow up meth labs, give birth to crack babies, commit suicide, or make donkey porn. If Little Timmy had just had more meatloaf, he might not have grown up to fill chest freezers with Cub Scout parts.”

Anthony on beauty:

“Few things are more beautiful to me than a bunch of thuggish, heavily tattooed line cooks moving around each other like ballerinas on a busy Saturday night.”

Anthony on travel:

“Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body.”

Anthony on standing for something:

“If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. The extent to which you can walk in someone else’s shoes or at least eat their food, it’s a plus for everybody. Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.”

This last one was so good I added it onto the opening page of A PARIS YEAR. You can pre-order here.

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The advance copy of my new book arrived in the post. There is nothing quite like the feeling of seeing an idea finally printed and bound into a book. An advanced copy is created early in the process to send to media folk who may want to provide quotes, reviews, feature in magazines, etc.

It’s called an ADVANCE UNCORRECTED PROOF, which means it might have a few spelling mistakes (which stops my heart every single time) and, even though the book is in full color, this advanced version is in black and white:

The book is an illustrated day book, a travel journal of sorts, that begins in January and ends in December. Each day there is a little something to learn about Paris, a sketch, or a painting. And each day tends to run into the next in theme, color-scheme, or story line. A few pages from March:

Another few…

I’m so thrilled with the black and white version that I’m sure I’ll be in pure bliss once the color version comes out in June 2017. You can pre-order it and it will be delivered to your mailbox or inbox in June 2017:

Barnes & Noble

Amazon (US)

Amazon (UK)

Indigo

Books-A-Million

IndieBound

Apple

Pre-ordering is one of the kindest thing you can do for an author.

More so than ordering the book the day after it comes out. Mais pourquoi?

Pre-orders propels the book to statistic stardom on sites like Amazon. Online booksellers rely on these stats, so naturally the author begins to rely on these stats, too. But even more than rank, pre-orders help bookstores know how many to order for their shelves on launch day, or if they want to order it at all. I remember back when I was considering writing books, I would walk through Barnes & Noble on Third Street in Santa Monica and look at where my books would live. Then I would research the books around where my book would live: Who was the agent? Who was the publisher? Clues on who to contact once my books were written. But if no one pre-orders from Barnes & Noble, the book doesn’t make it to those shelves. Quel dommage. And would-be writers of the future are left out of a golden opportunity. And no fun Francophile mail for you come June. Again, quel dommage.

Thanks to pre-orders for my last book Paris Letters, Barnes & Noble pick up the book, but they let me write a little story about how Bruce Springsteen made me a writer. So thanks Barnes & Noble! Barnes & Noble was also the scene in Paris Letters where I meet up with Ben and together we concoct our escape from our dreary lives. His real name is Paul Freeman and he’s the front man for the band The 100 Year War. A few years later we met up in Paris where he opened for a little known artist named Chris Isaak.

Sexiest video ever.

I digress. This happens when you only sleep in four-hour stints (if you’re lucky) due to a thirsty newborn. Where was I? Oh yes, the requisite author request to pre-order A Paris Year. Merci buckets.