In an elegant Parisian apartment building inhabited by bourgeois families, Renée, the concierge, is witness to their lavish but vacuous lives. Outwardly she conforms to every stereotype of the concierge: fat, cantankerous, addicted to television. Yet, unbeknownst to her employers, Renée is a cultured autodidact who adores art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture. Then there's Paloma, a 12-year-old genius who has decided to end her life on her...

McCullough mixes famous and obscure names and delivers capsule biographies of everyone to produce a colorful parade of educated, Victorian-era American travelers and their life-changing experiences in Paris.

"From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, a stunningly ambitious and beautiful novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II. Marie Laure lives with her father in Paris within walking distance of the Museum of Natural History where he works as the master of the locks (there are thousands of locks in the museum). When she is six,...

Anticipating their father’s imminent death, three siblings reunite at their home in Burgundy to preserve the vineyard that ties them together in this tender and modern tale of familial strife and resilience from director Cédric Klapisch. "*As rich and earthy as a fine French wine...*” - Peter Debrudge, ***Variety*** "*Four stars... Rich and absorbing.*" - G. Allen Johnson, ***The San Francisco Chronicle***

"Viann and Isabelle have always been close despite their differences. Younger, bolder sister Isabelle lives in Paris while Viann lives a quiet and content life in the French countryside with her husband Antoine and their daughter. When World War II strikes and Antoine is sent off to fight, Viann and Isabelle's father sends Isabelle to help her older sister cope. As the war progresses, it's not only the sisters' relationship that is tested, but also...

Arman is 33 and ready to make a change, starting with a run in the park. When he literally bumps into Amélie--slightly cynical but nevertheless lovely--on the jogging path, he's dead-set on making a connection with her. As a bit of contrived fate brings them together, Arman's best friend Benjamin suffers an unexpected stroke, relegating him to the hospital for weeks where he falls for his doting young physical therapist. Over the course of two autumns...

Filmmaker Nicolas Philibert (To be and to have, In the land of the deaf) travels to the Normandy countryside to catch up with the locals he helped cast in a movie three decades earlier - a starting point for a remarkably rich exploration of memory, history, madness, life and death, and, of course, the cinema.

France, 1714. In a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever--and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across...

When three hungry soldiers come to a town where all the food has been hidden, they set out to make soup of water and stones, and all the town enjoys a feast.

In Chicago in 1920, 28-year-old Hadley Richardson meets Ernest Hemingway. Following a whirlwind courtship and wedding, the pair set sail for Paris and become the golden couple in a lively group of expatriots, including Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and Gerald and Sara Murphy. But as Hadley struggles with self-doubt and jealousy, Ernest wrestles with his burgeoning writing career and both must confront a deception that could...