True Pleasures: A Memoir of Women in Paris

By Lucinda Holdforth

Book Overview

At a turning point in her life, Lucinda Holdforth journeys to Paris and takes a very personal tour through the lives, loves, and losses of its most celebrated women. From Colette to Nancy Mitford, Marie Antoinette to Coco Chanel, Napoleon's Josephine to Edith Wharton, all were rule-breakers and style-setters. Utterly diverse, they shared one common passion: Paris. Exploring the city in their footsteps, Holdforth, and readers, gain inspiration from the women who created and nurtured the world's most civilized city.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1553652843
• ISBN13: 9781553652847
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Greystone Books
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.74 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.3" x 0.5" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

Pure Pleasure

What a delightful book. If you love Paris you will love this book. And if you haven't been yet, you will go. Informative, romantic, delicious in every way.

Interesting & Inspirational

I read this book when I needed inspiration - and I found it here. Not only does the author provide insight into the lives of fabulous and famous women, she provides insight into her own life and how experiences in Paris influenced and shaped her. The book provides the perfect balance between historical facts, personal insight and the joys of life in Paris today. It also encourages you to read more books on each of these...

I loved this book!

I have a feeling the author and I would get along just fine! I too enjoy researching a historic figure (Catherine de Medici, Josephine, and Camille Claudel have all been recent obsessions) and then walking in her footsteps in Paris. Not only did this book reconnect me with some of my favorite femmes but it introduced me to more fascinating women and their neighborhoods. That thrill of discovery - when you look up at a particular...

Inspiring, insightful review of Paris' most engaging women

I loved this book. It is part biography, part philosophy, part social analysis. I found insight and inspiration in every chapter, and historical figures about whom I knew little or nothing came vividly to life. Holdforth goes to Paris to shake up her system and determine a direction for her life, and by studying the lives of many famous Parisian women (born there or elsewhere), she does just that. If you love Paris, want...