Thanks to Jill Shepperd of the English Book Centre in Valbonne, some rather splendid reading material came my way today. While I don’t doubt the ease in which the internet has turned book buying into the simplest of tasks I do wonder if it hasn’t made it somewhat mundane and impersonal. What, I ask myself, could be more glorious than the ability of visiting a real-life bookshop, discovering new titles or the anticipation of finding long lost old ones and even discussing authors and their books with the bookshop owner?

Last year I think I blogged how much I loved books and how I have a tendency to sniff them, wallowing in the smell of new pages or crusty old ones. I think I forgot to mention that I’d also learnt never, ever to lend one of your dearly prized possessions to anyone - be they your very best friend or marital partner. These books are not boomerangs - they don’t come back. So when Kathy Alex of Cooking with Friends lent me her own copy of Julia Child’s book My Life in France, I quickly realised that this would be a book I’d want to keep and treasure. I also knew the guilt I’d suffer if I held on to it. The solution was a quick call to Jill to ask her to get me my own copy. What I love about the book is Julia’s candid openness and great wit which makes it difficult not to stay awake into the wee small hours immersed in her world to find out what she’ll do next. But the book is made more fun because Kathy lives in the same home that Julia did on the Cote d’Azur and, because I know Kathy, indirectly I also know Julia.

My second book was another classic, Two Towns in Provence by MFK Fisher. Martin Hills had already highlighted this book to me a few weeks ago as being a rather good golden oldie and suggested that it merited a review. Now that I have it I can see what he meant and so have asked him to write a review for the next issue of AMB. It too is written from the heart and contains much nostalgia. Published in 1964 it is a delightful journey of a world that no longer exists but would have been charming to know.

But it is Jill’s third book which is rather special. By sheer fluke she came across Cote d’Azur - Inventing the French Riviera by Mary Blume. This book is now out of print so I’m over the moon she knew how excited I would be about finding it (proof - I’m blogging). I felt magnetized by it even after delving into a few pages. Crammed with nostalgic stories and some rather brilliant scandals Mary talks of a Cote d’Azur I would have loved to have known as one senses the French Riviera on the cusp of sliding out of innocence into industrialism, simplicity into mega tourism.

These are books I shall treasure and turn into friends while others in my bulging library shall remain as research material. And while I may appreciate the effectiveness of Google and other search engines, I am glad that I haven’t lost the ability to open a real book and read. Knowing how hard it is to write makes me appreciate so much more someone else’s effort.