A French Book Reading Resource

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Amandine
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Amandine » Wed Aug 24, 2022 6:34 am

I had a vague hankering to read a chunky historical novel in French so I googled for that and found this long list which might be of interest to people. Look at all those lovely sumptuous covers, lots of quivering décolletage and swashbuckling derring-do therein no doubt.

When I say list its a bookshop website, but laid out so clearly it's easy to browse.

https://www.lisez.com/index.php?tipo=su ... 5003&pag=1
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby DaveAgain » Wed Aug 24, 2022 7:47 am

Amandine wrote:I had a vague hankering to read a chunky historical novel in French so I googled for that and found this long list which might be of interest to people. Look at all those lovely sumptuous covers, lots of quivering décolletage and swashbuckling derring-do therein no doubt.

When I say list its a bookshop website, but laid out so clearly it's easy to browse.

https://www.lisez.com/index.php?tipo=su ... 5003&pag=1
I've been meaning to read one of Mireille Calmels Alienor of Aquitaine books forever :-) (Regine Pernoud's biography, and the Lion in Winter are the drivers there though!)
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MorkTheFiddle
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Wed Aug 24, 2022 5:48 pm

How could I forget reading an Angelique novel as an adolescent boy? In translation, though.
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Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby DaveAgain » Mon Sep 26, 2022 2:54 pm

Carmody wrote:Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky just increases my fascination with that time.

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For additional resources on the French exodus see:
1940 L'exode de juin 40
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkhnLJegnMw
I've just started reading Eric Alary's L'exode, in the introduction he mentions two books that he felt presented the Exode well, Ms Némirovsky's and 33 Jours by Léon Werth.
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Carmody
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Carmody » Mon Sep 26, 2022 5:35 pm

DaveAgain » Mon Sep 26, 2022 3:54 am

Carmody wrote:
Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky just increases my fascination with that time.

//////////
For additional resources on the French exodus see:
1940 L'exode de juin 40
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkhnLJegnMw
I've just started reading Eric Alary's L'exode, in the introduction he mentions two books that he felt presented the Exode well, Ms Némirovsky's and 33 Jours by Léon Werth.
Many thanks for the heads up. I had not heard of 33 Jours by Léon Werth but will definitely have to look into it.

Gratefully...........
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Le Baron » Fri Sep 30, 2022 9:43 am

It's been a while since I've read any French in-between all the Spanish, but I perused one of those little 'neighbourhood library' boxes that people tend to put at the end of their gardens now. They're usually full of the worst books like 'eat yourself thin' or 'management techniques for busy people' (and by the looks of it they were too busy to read it).

I found a novel in French Kiffe Kiffe Demain. Perhaps you've read it? It was a best-seller on publication (when the author was 19). It has a very girly pink cover with a photo of the author and I almost passed on it thinking it was 'chick-lit, but I took it anyway as 'light reading' for a change. I actually enjoyed it very much, brilliant book. Straightforward first-person narrative in a sort of diary-like style, lots of wry humour and some social commentary. An intelligent voice from les banlieues rather than the pseudo-intellectual middle-class preoccupations from the centre of Paris. I went through it in about three days.
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby jeffers » Fri Sep 30, 2022 1:04 pm

Le Baron wrote:It's been a while since I've read any French in-between all the Spanish, but I perused one of those little 'neighbourhood library' boxes that people tend to put at the end of their gardens now. They're usually full of the worst books like 'eat yourself thin' or 'management techniques for busy people' (and by the looks of it they were too busy to read it).

I found a novel in French Kiffe Kiffe Demain. Perhaps you've read it? It was a best-seller on publication (when the author was 19). It has a very girly pink cover with a photo of the author and I almost passed on it thinking it was 'chick-lit, but I took it anyway as 'light reading' for a change. I actually enjoyed it very much, brilliant book. Straightforward first-person narrative in a sort of diary-like style, lots of wry humour and some social commentary. An intelligent voice from les banlieues rather than the pseudo-intellectual middle-class preoccupations from the centre of Paris. I went through it in about three days.


Thanks for the suggestion, I'll give it a try for something a little different. I've purchased the Kindle edition, which has a much more sober cover, so I don't have to feel like I'm reading chick-lit. :D
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Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien (roughly, the perfect is the enemy of the good)

French SC Books: 0 / 5000 (0/5000 pp)
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Carmody
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Carmody » Fri Sep 30, 2022 7:39 pm

Kiffe Kiffe Demain sounds really good. I am all for teen literature where possible.

Another book in the same vein and for the same age group is 35 Kilos d'espoir by A. Gavalda that is about a student who is having trouble learning in school. It is not too long and has a great story to tell.
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Carmody
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Carmody » Sun Oct 02, 2022 11:47 pm

Hi folks,

Herewith just an update on recent book suggestions for you from Culturetheque and the local Alliance Française :
https://www.culturetheque.com/US/lire.aspx
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Carmody
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Re: A French Book Reading Resource

Postby Carmody » Thu Oct 06, 2022 2:15 pm

Annie Ernaux wins the 2022 Nobel prize in literature

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/oct/06/annie-ernaux-wins-the-2022-nobel-prize-in-literature

Congratulations to Annie but what do you think of her books? I have read a couple and they did not seem like Nobel prize material. Please tell me what it is I do not get.......
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