A Novel Bookstore

 by Laurence Cossé
translated from French by Alison Anderson
Europa Editions, English translation 2010, original French publication Éditions Gallimard, 2009







Here's a book that simply must be read and then talked about among my reading pals. Get on it please, everybody!

The idea is that two mismatched loners start a bookstore for people who are, like them, uninterested in all parts of popular culture, and passionate about interesting books. They will stock only good books, and they call it THE GOOD NOVEL. This mission comes very close to my ideas about reading, and culture generally. They organize a secret selection committee, a group of writers who choose books with their identities shielded, to avoid unwelcome pressure and/or attention from publishers and media and prize committees, so they can work from conviction only, without any commercial considerations. Ahh!

In fact, Cosse writes on p. 385 "...if...The Good Novel was so successful that it brought about the unexpected rebirth of a practice you would have thought was timeless–the appreciation of talent as its just value." Isn't that just the problem with contemporary culture?

Apart from the novel's value per se, and despite it's slightly shaky translation, it offers a fabulous reading list for someone who would rather be offended (or anything other) than bored. As soon as I finished it, I went to look to see if someone had created the list of books mentioned as a stand-alone document, and what I found, to my pleased surprise, is that www.thegoodnovel.com, as described in the book, exists with (at least a partial) book list available. Now the book I was hoping would be captured there was not: El pintor de batallas by Pérez-Reverte. I do not own (or even know of this book) but I was attracted to Captain Alatriste by Pérez-Reverte, don't know why and it was probably a delete, which I bought for my reading pile. Gratifying and motivating. Must pull it up to nearer the top. Must look for El pintor, in English.

Here in Italy I know from the beach two very cultured sisters, from Prato, and they chase down art shows nearby, and go to the opera, and they finish each others' sentences like: "Well yes, of course,..." "...Stendhal." Is that cool, or what? Now Stendhal is on my list anyway, as an all-time star of literature, and in one of those delightful connections of life, he wrote a biography of Rossini, which I would also like to read, for the usual reasons (ie opera and Pesaro) and of course he in stock at The Good Novel. Again, gratifying and motivating.

And very much in line with part of the ideal position of The Good Novel: to create a community of readers, recommending and suggesting and exploring and enjoying. Next job: print out the list and check off the titles I have read. I keep a file of interesting reading lists, lists that are as quirky as I can find, of course.

Funnily, when I was looking for the reading list from A Novel Bookstore, I found the Time Magazine book critics Top 100 since 1923, Here on the beach I recently read Codex by Lev Grossman, Decent beach reading, in the books-about-books category, mashed up with a story about video games. I was puzzled that there were no biographical notes about the author, of whom I had never heard. Turns out, he is a book critic at Time magazine, perfectly illustrating EXACTLY the other way of book publishing: connected, eye on the prize, hitting the current cultural memes with precision, an author with a foot in a few camps within the industry. Little to do with "...appreciating talent as its just value". Still, I think I will print this list too, and check it off, but all the while I will be thinking cui bono (who benefits?).

I also found that Wikipedia (my beloved Wikipedia, I should have said) has a list of reading lists! Quite long, but I see I will have to add a few items, like the best reading by country, math fiction, art fiction and, of course, the list from A Novel Bookstore.

The marigold is wondering nervously: How much time can I spare from reading to consider and compiling reading lists? So compelling....

LibraryThing Early (Late) Review

A Man in Uniform
by Kate Taylor

I enjoyed Taylor's first book, Madame Proust and the Kosher Kitchen, and looked forward to reading A Man in Uniform, but it had to wait until I returned from vacation, and actually waited until it is no longer an early review. Oh well.

The book is set in a charming place and period of history, one that Taylor also mined for her previous book, Mme. Proust and the Kosher Kitchen, Paris in the late 19th C. There is no shortage of delightful material written about the period by authors actually of the period, and those writers avoid the trap of the anachronism, which possibly no contemporary writer can.

I once had a professor who remarked that as citizens of the post-Freudian world, we simply cannot get out of our minds the Freudian paradigm and imagine Hamlet, say, without Freudian overtones. Similarly, conversations written by writers of our time set in other times, often sound either too modern or stilted, and I found this to be the case here. As well, and related, the editorial decisions about when to insert French words and titles seemed quite irregular and puzzling. No help for it, really, and I know it makes me kind of an old pedant to notice and care. Oh well to that, too.

On the other hand, how interesting to read a story about the Dreyfus affair that had LITERALLY NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STORY OF THE DREYFUS AFFAIR! It was about the personal journey of some characters who were tangential to the main issue. I have to say that, in itself, this is an appealing and contemporary approach, one that would never have been considered by writers of that time.

I do not imagine that my criticisms are of things that would stop if from appearing on many bedside tables, as the Globe and Mail's blurb on the book has it. I can see it being a very pleasant and easy glimpse into the period, as enjoyable as having a postcard of Monet's water lilies on your bulletin board at work, and as much an actual piece of art.

As a true LibraryThing devotee though, I have to make some recommendations: Of course it is better to read Proust on his period than some Canadian woman of the 21st C writing about his time. Less forbiddingly, if only for its length, one of my all-time favourite books happens to be In the Land of Pain by Alphonse Daudet. He was a writer, a contemporary and friend of Proust and the Impressionists. He kept a journal while he sickened and died of syphilis. It is a small beautiful volume and describes the daily routine of the haute-bourgeois, with the big lunch at home prepared by a cook, and the afternoon visits to a mistress, by one who lived it. (In fact, I wonder if Taylor has read it and used it to inform her writing.) In addition the expressiveness of Daudet as he worries, and sickens, and wonders, and despairs, is indescribable.

In other words, go ahead and read A Man in Uniform if it comes to you, but if you are seeking out books, you can do better.

Can't get to Italy - still pursuing reading for France

Despite some amount of preparation and drafting of a book list for a trip to Italy, I am not yet finished with France.

Here was a comment left for the posting re: Joan of Arc books:

poetbdk said...

Mark Twain's biography is probably the best one on the list you have but I can not say for sure as I have only read about half of them. The complete Twain book is available online at:
http://www.maidofheaven.com/joanofarc_mark_twain.asp

August 9, 2009 5:27 PM

As far as I can understand, his suggested link take one to the essay, which was appended to the book, as part of a link to a current book, but
this link:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/conte-joanofarc.html

takes you to the full-text on-line version of the book.

I'm there!

Not finished on Paris yet...

Of course, I forgot to mention the Madeline books, by Ludwig Bemelmans, which would be essential for kids visiting Paris, and I came across Little Bo in Paris by Julie Andrews Edwards in my own kid's bookshelf, which I do not think any of us have read, but which I would definitely pull out if I was heading there with mine.

There are also many books and series about artists, with their stories and their art, particularly the French impressionists, any or all of which would also let a kid feel like they knew something about Paris and art before they even got there:
A lovely book, more or less about the Musée d'Orsay, is Laurent de Brunhoff's Babar's Museum of Art. Laurence Anholt and Richard Muhlberger have both written several books in this category, any of which would be worth looking at with kids.

Further Suggestions for Paris Reading

People I know are fascinated by the idea of finding something perfect to read on a trip to Paris, and the suggestions keep coming. Luckily the people I know are really interested in books, so the suggestions are great. Here they are, in no particular order:

Vita Sackville-West wrote a biography called Saint Joan of Arc, which a friend told me of, but had not read. I loved her book about her garden Sissinghurst, and the memoir of life with his parents written by her son Nigel Nicholson, so this sounds promising.

Two friends (a married couple, of all things) both said they LOVED Geaorge Bernard Shaw's Joan of Arc book, Saint Joan. Must read?

A good friend recommended The Piano Shop on the Left Bank by Thad Carhart - a book about music: it sounds like heaven.

Essays by French philosophers, such as Pascal and Montaigne. (Not to make it sound like philosophy is my life, but I have read a few of each, and they are surprisingly entertaining, and I would gladly accept a gift of such a book to take on a trip to Paris). There is also Sartre. In what city beside Paris would you really conclude that "Hell is other people?" Hmmm?

George Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London came highly recommended.

I was told I should have thought of and also mentioned Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

And Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary, which I LOVED, but thought of as provincial, rather than Parisian. Its literary value over-rides that consideration. I was wrong not to mention it.

I thought of Auguste Dupin - Edgar Allan Poe's french detective, admired by Arthur Conan Doyle, and the progenitor of all detectives, a character created before the word even existed. The most famous story is Murder in the Rue Morgue, but there is also The Purloined Letter and The Mystery of Marie Rogêt. Must dig out my copy of his complete works. Yes.

Something worthwhile for kids would be the Disney movie The Hunchback of Notre Dame. They would be discovering something familiar once on a trip to Paris, which is, I think, more the point than the value of the movie per se.

The Marigold asks nervously: Is there still more? Of course there is. Is it worth mentioning? Probably. Do I have time? Ack!

"Please add a book about Joan of Arc to your Paris reading list."

I got nothin'.
Never read a Joan of Arc book that I can recall.
However, here are the top 10 books tagged fiction and Joan of Arc on LibraryThing

• Joan of Arc by Mark Twain
• Saint Joan: A Chronicle Play in Six Scenes and an Epilogue by Bernard Shaw
• An Army of Angels: A Novel of Joan of Arc by Pamela Marcantel
• Blood Red, Sister Rose by Thomas Keneally
• Gilles and Jeanne by Michel Tournier
• Dove and Sword: A Novel of Joan of Arc (Point Signature) by Nancy Garden
• The Merlin of St. Gilles' Well (Joan of Arc Tapestries,… by Ann Chamberlin
• Destiny by Alex Archer
• Young Joan by Barbara Dana
• The Path of the King by John Buchan

Anyone know anything? Anyone? Anyone?

The Marigold asks nervously:
What would be a readable biography, or other non-fiction on this person?

Couple extra Paris books to mention

How could I have forgotten: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. I have not read it, but as Pierre Bayard says in How to Talk about Books You Haven't Read (see prior post on this), I know the important things: the author, the setting of the French Revolution, the famous opening lines ("It was the best of times..."). A trip to Paris would be the PERFECT time to read the real thing. I guess this is the moment to mention Les Misérables by Victor Hugo as well.

Also, I did not mention Iréne Némirovsky's books, because I have not read them, but I would maybe try to get my hands on Suite Française to read for a trip.

I debated but did not include The Many Lives and Secret Stories of Josephine B, about Napoleon's creole empress, by Sandra Gulland, but I have decided to mention it after all - it is a reasonable piece of historical fiction about Paris.

PS I have written a post about what to see or read for a trip to New York with kids, and maybe I'll add a "travel reading" tag to make such lists easy to search.

Reading on the way to Paris

Recently, tons of requests poured in for me to a recommend a book to read on a trip to Paris. Well…one request really, but what a great assignment.

I love to rummage around in the reading relating to a place I am visiting. I am very slowly working my way through The Aeneid during my summers in Italy. I have read Tacitus, the classic I, Claudius by Robert Graves, and lots of Roman history fiction. I will think up a Rome reading list for myself this summer and write it up separately.

For Paris, there are the French classics –
I would take a stab at reading more Proust and/or Balzac.

I would think about the period of the Impressionists, and these are books I liked:
Lydia Cassatt Reading the Morning Paper by Harriet Stone Chessman
I am Madame X by Gioa Diliberto, about the artist John Singer Sargent in Paris
In the Land of Pain by Alphonse Daudet (one of my favourite books – a memoir by a syphilitic contemporary of the great writers and artists of the 19th C - too grim for some, but I think it is exquisite)

A Canadian novel I enjoyed was Mme Proust and the Kosher Kitchen by Kate Taylor

Iain Pear's serious novel The Dream of Scipio covers a lot of French history as does
Perfume by Patrick Suskind and
GG Kay's Ysabel, in fantasy format

For a more modern France (and for a non-fiction reader) these could be good
Julia Child’s memoir My Life in France (I could only get through about half)
Paris to the Moon by Adam Gopnik (still on my to read pile)
A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle (I read it. People love it but it was not my cup of vin)

For a laugh, I loved
Steve Martin’s Picasso at the Lapin Agile and other plays and
David Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day

For a kid:
Eloise in Paris by Kay Thompson is perfect.

Now the marigold is wondering nervously:
Have I forgotten anything? and
Should I have mentioned The Da Vinci Code?