“Then, over coffee, he came to the point: would I like to be his mistress? I laughed out loud. He looked me dead in the eye, his pouting little mouth twitching with indignation: ‘I don’t make jokes about such matters.’”
Available now in paperback and ebook
Table of Contents
1. Proposal
Driving and Breakfast
2. The Secret Garden
Slap and Tickle, Guilt and Parking
Adultery and the Cult of Beauty
3. Being a Woman
La Libido, La Femme Fatale and the Sisterhood
4. Truth versus Beauty
Tragedy, Comedy and Historic French Losers
Television, Hypocrisy and Ideas
5. The Wedding
Catholicism, Anti-Semitism and Le Pen
Language, Yoghurt and Hot Rabbits
6. Sublime, Necessarily Sublime
Mayors, Mass Demonstration and Mayhem
Nobility, Freedom and Status
7. Maternity
Glory, Breastfeeding and the Norm
8. Education
Freud, Maths and the Cult of Reason
Smiley, Happy People
9. The Past
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
French Rudeness, Surrender and Betrayal
Collaboration and Defeat
10. Foreign Affairs
Cake and Spies
Anti-Americanism and La Force de Frappe
11. Tolérance Zéro
Cops and Spooks
France’s War on Terror
12. Sarkozy and the End of Ideology
Sex Dwarves and the Patriarchy
The Society of the Spectacle and the End of the Secret Garden
13. Black, Blanc, Beur
Football, Rap and Role Models
14. Epilogue
Douce France
Hello!
I love your blog, and look forward to reading your new book. However, I live in France and do not like to buy things online, so I’d like to know if the book will be available to buy in bookstores across France this summer? My friend (who also ha a blog) received a copy from the publishing house, but I’m too anxious to read the book and don’t want to wait for her to finish it!
Could you please tell me how I can acquire a copy?
Thank you,
Crystal (a Canadian girl married to a Frenchman, living in Paris and still baffled by all things French)
Crystal, hello. Thank you for your kind words. If you’re in Paris, please try to buy it at Sylvia Whitman’s bookshop near Notre Dame, Shakespeare and Co. It’s a wonderful place that you should know about (if you don’t already). I’ll be doing a reading there on Aug 3rd. Do come if you’re around – and we’ll workshop that bafflement.
Hello Lucy,
Is your book out in the US? Thanks,
G.
Not yet, Giusi.
LW
Hi Lucy,
I’m in the midst of reading your wonderful book, ringing so many bells for us now living in France with our four children, (we’re all English though, and living in the Haute -Loire).
We were talking last night to French friends about it, and wondered if a French translation is available?
Thrilled to have discovered the blog in my search for this info! I’m looking forward to following your thoughts and observations!
Many congratulations on a superb work (my husband loved it too), it’s made a lot of things about living here a lot clearer!
All best wishes
Amanda
PS. Hope all goes well in the bosom of the wonderful French health care system… look forward to your return to the keyboard!
Best wishes
Amanda
Chère Lucy,
Votre livre est tout simplement une merveille intellectuelle !
En tant que française vivant à Londres, je confirme la triste réalité qui est parfaitement bien illustrée tout au long de votre livre.
Quand mes clients me disent : « Paris est une ville merveilleuse, majestueuse et romantique. »
J’ai envie de leur répondre : « Ce n’est qu’en apparence car Paris souffre beaucoup aujourd’hui de nombreux problèmes politiques, économiques et socioculturels.»
Je voudrais aussi ajouter qu’étant jeune quand les divergences d’opinions se sont transformées en véritable guerre idéologique entre la France et l’Algérie, je n’ai malheureusement pas pu réaliser l’ampleur des évènements et grâce à votre livre, j’ai pu apprendre beaucoup plus de ce qui avait été enseigné à l’école par nos professeurs d’histoire et comprendre davantage les tensions qui règnent en banlieue encore aujourd’hui.
Pour finir, merci de votre honnêteté, merci d’ouvrir les yeux à ceux qui veulent se cacher la vérité et merci pour ce petit plaisir intellectuel qui fut partagé par de nombreux lecteurs.
Bien à vous,
Sophie
Hi Lucy,
Je m’appelle Lucie, et suis une française de 23 ans vivant en Angleterre depuis 6 mois. Votre livre m’a accompagné tout au long de mon séjour (qui se termine) et m’a aidé à mieux comprendre ces deux pays voisins aux cultures pourtant assez différentes. J’ai beaucoup aimé ce livre et m’y suis bien retrouvée en tant qu’expatrié en Angleterre.
Cordialement,
Lucie
Hello Lucy
Currently reading your SLOF book.
I left the UK to come to live and work in Paris in the 1990′s.
I agree with many of your observations. Except for the sex. Either my French colleagues and friends keep that part of their lives very well hidden, or you were moving in a very different “entourage social”!
I first went to France to au-pair in 1965, aged nineteen, and have been drawn back very often, ever since. I have much enjoyed reading SLOF, which has been so evocative and at the same time, enlightening. Thank you.
However, I am anxious to know if it has, or indeed will be, translated into French because, as you can imagine, I would love to discuss it with several of my good French friends! Please let me know the outcome.
Dear Lucy,
I have read your book with the greatest delight. I also lived for eighteen years in Paris between years 68 and 85 all my souvenirs came back reading your book….I now live in the depts of the countryside in the south west.
I really miss the British sense of humour, the theatre, the music scene and the ‘sense civic’. My daughter who was born and brought up in Paris, also prefers London although she married a Frenchman. I am sending your book to her as I am sure she will enjoy it as much as I did.
Like Debbie, I would like to know whether it has been published in French as I want to offer it to ‘some’ of my French friends.
Thank you.
Lucy
In Barbados on hol and just read your book. Loved it. Made me understand why Arsen Wenger is such a bad loser! Must be tough to be French and ambitious – at least our language covers half the world. Me and my partner Sarah plan to sell our Music Colleges business in about 3/4 years time and need to get out of UK so we came and looked at Luberon recently as a potential base – but you have made me think twice, especially on the alienation of language which was a worry that you have confirmed. It wouldn’t necessarily stop us but total commitment is a heavy concept.
I plan to write too and have done 3 years column on songwriting for a music mag, plus I have written a couple of potential book ideas that have been sitting on my laptop for years. Then there is the memoirs thing that might be cool for my kids. I fancy doing your workshop, looks fab. If Sarah came along could she do yoga? We are a bit joined at the hip!
Kevin
I’m pleased that you enjoyed the book but hope that your misgivings about France weren’t exacerbated by it. I suspect that if you come to Gardoussel most of them will evaporate.
The couple who run the retreat centre tell me that Sarah would be very welcome but as it’s a writing only retreat there’ll be no yoga being taught that week. She could either join the course or alternatively take up the full-board option and just relax in a beautiful place and be with you after class. The best thing would be to get in touch with Sharon Black, the extremely nice woman who runs Gardoussel. Her email is:
sharonblack1969@yahoo.com
All best wishes,
Lucy
Having married a French man myself, lived in Paris and its outskirts for ten years and had two children there, I can safely say that there isn’t one word in your book with which I disagree! Like you, I spent a great deal of time utterly infuriated by everything from the schooling, police and fonctionnaires to the driving, television, music etc etc. In the end I had to admit that the French (certainly the Parisians) and I were incompatible. I moved back to the UK, got divorced, put my children in a European school to keep up their French (but where they also get a dose of less rigid English teachers) and am now with a Welshman – who understands my humour and says thank you when I do things for him.
Thank you so much for this book. Although I wrote many articles on living in France for an English speaking magazine in Paris, I never got round to a book. If I had, I dare to hope that this would have been the one!
Emma
PS How can you stay in a country where they don’t even have a word for “fun”??!
I put your book on my Christmas list after reading a review in the Sydney Morning Herald. Luckily my Secret Santa bought it for me and I’m thoroughly enjoying reading it. Having visited France a few times it does help to explain many things about the French – well done!
Incidentally have you seen the French movie Sarah’s Key (Elle s’appelait Sarah) – it’s well worth watching. I only saw it the other day after I’d started reading your book which made both your book and the movie even more fascinating.
Cheers,
Michelle
I loved your book, it made me laugh but also made me sad. Having lived in France for 6 years it made me understand many issues I have faced over the years.
Sadly I would prefer not to stay here though it is a beautiful country – I feel like an alien! Four eyes, six legs and I understand and speak French (not the best!).
I am so glad I found your blog/site. Thank you.
Hi Lucy,
I’ve just finished your great book . I could identify with so much of what you wrote. I came here about forty years ago and, like you, am divorced and have French children. As a teacher (certifiée) with the Ed Nat, I could also see your point about the education system. Hope Jack’s Masters has gone well and he gets the agreg!
All the best, Judy
Hi Lucy
Have just spent a delicious three weeks camping in various parts of France and I read your book which I thought was funny, informative and extremely helpful in getting some idea of how France ticks.
I thought your book pretty readable and now you are living in the countryside, perhaps you can write another book about that experience. I suspect Paris is probably quite different from the rest of France.
Anyway, although my favourite destination is Italy, France is not far behind!
thanks for the good read.
Best,
Richard
Hello Lucy,
Can we compare the writer of The Secret Life with Zadie Smith in White Teeth? Is there any relation between reality and fiction in your narration?
Best regards,
Dino
Hello Lucy. Loved your book; as a French leaving in Australia it … helped me to understand better where I am from and why after 22 years in Australia , I married … a french woman. Then I realised how french I am and wondered where it might be coming from (yes from France obviously) ; somehow I thought that leaving that far away would filter my blood and add some Anglo bits in it ; well it probably does to a certain point. With 4 kids , 2 born here and 2 born in France , question remains about where we want to be next and … you chose les Cevennes !
Your book landed in my hands cause a 14 y.o who saw the book on his way back from England to Australia, wanted to make a gift to his mum … he saw France on it, she loves France , she is an English friend. Conversations about belonging and comparison never end.
Many thanks .
J-Christophe
By the way , is there a French translation in the pipeline ?
J-Christophe
Hi Lucy, I’m a blog writer from Australia (http://mademoiselleslimalicious.blogspot.com/) and also a big fan of your book “The Secret Life of France”. I am French myself, been living overseas for the last 6 years. Your book has helped me understand myself better. I would love to publish an interview of yourself for my readers, with a focus on pressure on French women to be beautiful and slim at all costs. Would you be interested? This could increase the sales of your book in Australia. Please contact me at cyndiebowen (at) gmail (dot) com – I look forward to hearing from you.