On my trip to New York City this spring, I picked up a pocket-sized edition of Maurice Leblanc’s seminal work, The Adventures of Arsène Lupin, Gentleman-Thief, in the gift shop of the New York Public Library. I was thrilled to find a copy in English because to my own dismay, I have yet been able…
Tag: France
Book Review: The Nine
I wouldn’t call myself a history buff, but I have always been interested in looking back to learn about the world through the lens of historical documentation. In school, I really loved history assignments, literature reviews, biopics, geography challenges and researching about any topic that brought me back into a previous time. But for some…
Book Review: Lost Illusions
A few years ago, I read (and totally enjoyed) Père Goirot, one of Honoré de Balzac’s most famous novels in his massive work, La Comédie humaine, which is comprised of 90 novels featuring 2,000 characters who cross between the books. As a lover of classic European literature (my favorite book is Les Misèrables), I was…
Musing No. 2
When you lay under a treeAnd look up,What do you focus on?Is it the sky, the clouds, the branches, the leaves?Do you position yourselfIn such a wayTo see or to be hidden?Do the sun’s rays catch your faceOr do the shadows grace your cheek?Do you notice the air aboveOr the ground below?Are the bumps in…
Paris, France | 2021-22
In the middle of the pandemic, when travel restrictions were fairly light, my parents took an international trip to the Caribbean. During a post-trip debrief over pizza, we collectively wondered aloud “what if we took a family trip over the Christmas holiday?” Mind you, this was mid-November. So, that didn’t leave us much time to…
Paris, France | 2023
Our entrance into Paris was somewhat less triumphant than we would have liked as one of our students was left behind in Germany—unfortunate moment as a group leader involving an unexpected change in train platforms, some AirPods and an incorrect assumption that everyone made the mad dash across the station. Fortunately, everything worked out as…
Book Review: The Paris Novel
Once upon a time, my best friend and I owned a business. Of the many lovely experiences we offered, Book & Dinner Club was my favorite. Over the course of six weeks, we would host a group of women to discuss a book with a strong focus on food and/or travel and feed them home-cooked…
Book Review: All the Light We Cannot See
I am certain I had looked at All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr on the shelves at Barnes & Noble for years without really considering purchasing a copy. Last fall, I when I saw promotional videos for the forthcoming Netflix mini-series of the same name, I was intrigued to find out more…
Book Review: Parisians
In case you’re new here, I’m an American who once upon a decade ago, lived in Paris for a year whilst I completed a master’s degree. That year was one of the best and simultaneously most challenging years of my life. I loved the endless charm of the architecture, the smell of the flowers, the…
Checking the motives of lifelong learning
I love learning. I’m an Enneagram 5, which if you know anything about the Enneagram, you know that means I’m a hoarder of knowledge, resources and energy. Fortunately, I’m a fairly healthy 5, so I stay relatively engaged in the world and I don’t cling to too many worldly possessions. I do, however, have piles…
L.M.Beatty 