Tuesday Intros -- Abby's Journey

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I am reading Abby's Journey as part of a blog tour for the author Steena Holmes. I think they contacted me because of my love of travel, and the character Abby travels to Europe to experience the Christmas markets.
This story is about Abby whose mother died giving birth to her, and since Abby was premature, she has always had health issues. When her doctor gives her a clear bill of health, her grandmother whisks her away to Munich, Salzburg and Brussels so they can experience the Christmas markets, something Abby's mother always dreamed of doing.

Here's the intro, a prologue which is a letter from Claire, Abby's mother, to her husband, before she died:

Dear Josh,
I've written this letter a thousand times (okay that might be exaggerating just a little, but I have written it a few times now). At first, it was a list of parenting tips, because that's what I do, I write lists. And then you would read it and memorize it, because that's what you do to humor me.
But then I realized that I don't want the last letter I write to you to be solely a display of my inner control freak. But Josh, the list is a good one. It really is. So how about this -- I'll add it to the end of this letter on a separate sheet, so you can post it on the fridge or leave it on your desk, somewhere you can reference it when things get too hard.

 I'm also joining in with Teaser Tuesday which is a weekly bookish meme, hosted Ambrosia @The Purple Booker.
Here's my teaser from page 6, which is a letter to Abby from her mother:

"Don't be afraid to dream great things -- things you think are beyond your grasp.
Trust me. I know what I'm talking about. If I'd given up on my dream for a baby, you wouldn't be here. And honestly, I can't imagine that. 

What do you think?
I'll be reviewing this book on March 16 if you want to come back to see what I think.  

Tuesday Intro -- The Flower Arrangement

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I've already finished The Flower Arrangement by Ella Griffin, but really enjoyed it so wanted to share with the rest of you. Here's the intro:

Dublin was deserted at 7 a.m. on Saturday except for a pair of die-hard Friday-night clubbers kissing in the doorway of the antique shop at the corner of Pleasant Street. Three purposeful seagulls flew along the curving line of Camden Street, then took a sharp right along Montague Lane. Gray clouds were banked above the rooftops but the heavy rain had thinned out to a fine drizzle, and a slant of weak sunshine cut through the gloom and lit a shining path along the drenched pavement ahead of Laura. She stepped into it, luxuriating in the faint prickle of heat on the back of her neck. 

 I'm also joining in with Teaser Tuesday which is a weekly bookish meme, hosted Ambrosia @The Purple Booker.
Here's my teaser from page 97:
Tall and slight and graceful, with a yoga body and black hair with glints of silver shot through it. She looks like a woman from a W. B. Yeats' poem, beautiful and sad.

This sweet novel set in Ireland focuses on Laura who turned to running a flower shop, Blossom & Grow, after her baby died.She throws herself into making people happy through flowers. She finally decides she is ready to try for a baby again, when she learns her husband is no longer committed to the relationship. Laura is supported by her brother and a cast of characters whose stories interweave with her own as they find love and disappointment. It reminds me a bit of Love Actually, except it isn't Christmas and it isn't London. The descriptions of the glorious flowers and the insight into the depth of each character really transported me. I liked it a lot. 4.5 stars.

Tuesday Intros -- The Perfect Comeback of Caroline Jacobs

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
Today, I was determined to have an intro that is not connected to France. So I chose The Perfect Comeback of Caroline Jacobs by Matthew Dicks.  Truthfully, I hesitate to pick up a book written by a man, especially a man writing from a woman's viewpoint, but the story sounds interesting so I

thought I'd try it.
Here's the intro:

Caroline Jacobs rose, pointed her finger at the woman seated at the center of the table reserved for the PTO president and her officers, and said it. Shouted it, in fact. In the cafeteria of Benjamin Banneker High School, surrounded by crowded bulletin boards, scuffed linoleum, and the lingering smell of chicken nuggets, Caroline Jacobs had shouted a four-letter word. The four-letter word.
The room fell silent. 

 I'm also joining in with Teaser Tuesday which is a weekly bookish meme, hosted Ambrosia @The Purple Booker.
Here's my teaser from page 37:

"Your daughter attacked another student in the biology lab this morning."
"She attacked someone?"
"Yes," Dr. Powers said. "A classmate. Mr. Schultz said that the girls were arguing about something in the back of the classroom and then Polly began shouting. Using profanity, from what I'm told. Before Mr. Shultz could reach them to intervene, Polly had punched Miss Dinali in the face. In the nose to be exact."

Interested to see where this books goes. What do you think?

Tuesday Intros -- The Paris Effect

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
The cover of this book definitely sucked me in, and I'm so glad I read The Paris Effect by KSR Burns. I'll be reviewing it for FranceBookTours on January 10 so I hope you'll come back to see my review and  have a chance to win a copy.

Amy and her closest friend Kat spent years planning the perfect Paris trip, which they would take place whenever Kat conquered cancer and Amy's husband absented himself on a long business trip. But Kat didn't survive, so Amy finds herself sneaking off to Paris alone.
Here's the intro:

Seven p.m. A Wednesday. Two weeks to the day after the funeral. Kat is dead. I am not.
What I am is hungry.
And majorly pissed off at William. 

I'm also joining in with Teaser Tuesday which is a weekly bookish meme, hosted Ambrosia @ The Purple Booker.

Here's the teaser:

He falls asleep thirty seconds later and I lie next to him, watching his chest rise and fall. I will wait two more days and then I will take the home pregnancy test I have stashed behind the towels in the linen closet.

and

Accordingly, the Sacre Couer painting in the window is not only non-contrite but sassy. It vibrates, quivers, shimmers, twitches with joy. It yearns to jump up and do the cancan.

I love this  interpration of Sacre Couer, the big white church located in Montmartre with a spectacular view of Paris (see my previous post).
Although the cover might make you think this book is chick lit, it deals with some heavy subjects and has a slightly sinister feel, leaving me very anxious throughout as I sped through to find out what happened. You can find it here at Amazon for $4.99 on Kindle or $11.99 in paperback.
I'm excited to see what everyone else is reading too.
Thanks for visiting and commenting.

Tuesday Intros -- Fa-La-Llama-La

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

I'll be reading and reviewing Fa-La-Llama-La by Stephanie Dagg for France Book Tours. I read and reviewed Stephanie's previous memoir Heads Above Water where she described her family's move to France and attempt to start a camping and fishing vacation retreat. I guess she has

successfully done it now, because she has llamas and goats and all sorts of barnyard fowl. I'm sure this new novel, which she describes as a romantic comedy, will be just the mood lifter I need during the coming weeks.
Here's the intro:

"How are you fixed for the next week or so?" my cousin asked.
Talk about a silly question. I glowered at my phone.
"Joe, it's nearly Christmas," I reminded him. "I'm temporarily living with my parents, as I know you know. I will be eating too much, which is bad since it will go straight to my hips, and probably drinking too much, which is also bad, but given recent events, I'm not sure I care. With any luck I'll forget about them."

The events that Noelle wants to forget about are losing her job, being dumped by her fiance and the death of her grandmother, so she takes a pet-sitting job feeding llamas in France over Christmas.
Hope you're reading something to raise your spirits or to challenge your mind.

Tuesday Intros -- But You Are in France, Madame

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

Catherine Berry is a lover of France like me and her family  actually moved to France for a year. That's what her book But You Are in France, Madame is about. I have to admit that the title confuses me a little bit because I'm not sure where to put the emphasis, like were they lost and someone said, "But you are in France, Madame." Or did she want to do something the way the Australians do it and someone said, "But you are in France, Madame." There are just so many places to put the emphasis. Here's the intro from Chapter 1.

"Congratulations, you are Italian!"
"That's all I have to do to get my Italian passport? It's that easy?" my husband replied.
"No, now we do the paperwork!" Grinning widely, the embassy official rose from behind the counter to hug and kiss my husband, resulting in a spectacular near miss of cultural proportions.
And so began the paperwork, lots of it...and the spiral of confusion (ours), smiling affability at our confusion (theirs) and hours waiting in the embassy queue, just to be told why the documents we had been instructed to find at the previous visit were no longer the right ones.
Time was running out for us. We had been talking about our year in France for years, family and friends were worn down with cheering us along from the sidelines of our hurdle-strewn marathon to the airport tarmac. My husband and I, both Australian-born, but of European descent, knew that if our family's French adventure were to be anything more than a three-month touristy jaunt, we would need extra documents. Either my husband had to get his Italian passport, or I had to have a British one approved. Both seemed an even better option; hence his misleadingly optimistic exchange above.  

 Thanks for visiting and I look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading.

Tuesday Intros -- Vinegar Girl

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

Last Friday, a gloriously sunny and breezy day, I found myself with two hours free between classes.
I decided to set off for the main library downtown. It was closed for more than a year and remodeled and I hadn't visited yet.
While there, I scooped up three books and have happily immersed myself in Vinegar Girl by Anne

Tyler.
Here's the intro:

Kate Battista was gardening out back when she heard the telephone ring in the kitchen. She straightened up and listened. Her sister was in the house, although she might not be awake yet. But then there was another ring, and two more after that, and when she finally heard her sister's voice it was only the announcement on the answering machine. "Hi-yee! It's us? We're not home, looks like? So leave a --"
By that time Kate was striding toward the back steps tossing her hair off her shoulders with an exasperated "Tech!" She wiped her hands on her jeans and yanked the screen door open. "Kate," her father was saying, "pick up."

This is apparently a modernized version of Taming of the Shrew. I'd say Kate is a bit "on the spectrum," not picking up emotional cues from others, like her father the scientist. I'm enjoying the book though.
Thanks for visiting and I look forward to seeing what  you are reading.

Tuesday Intros -- The Light of Paris

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I'm not doing nearly enough reading these days, but teaching seven college courses keeps me pretty
busy. I'm truly enjoying Eleanor Brown's The Light of Paris. She has some lovely passages as she tells the story of Madeleine in 1999, a woman in a sterile marriage living in a Chicago high rise with her powerful husband, and that of her grandmother, Margie in 1924, who travels to Paris as a chaperone to her younger cousin and decides to stay. I love traveling back in time and to Paris during that time after World War I as artists, writers and philosophers tried to make sense of the world.
Here's the intro, actually, the 2nd paragraph, which I think is more representative of the novel:

I had the best of intentions, always: to make my mother happy, to keep the peace, to smooth my rough edges and ease my own way. But in the end, the life I had crafted was like the porcelain figurines that resided in my mother's china cabinets: smooth, ornate, but delicate and hollow. For display only. Do not touch. 

Hope you're reading something fabulous and have more reading time than I do.

Tuesday Intros -- Ally Hughes Has Sex Sometimes

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

I took a photo of the book cover
because the cover on Amazon is
very different, but this one has a shiny
cover on it, which doesn't photograph well.

I picked up this book because I heard the author on the radio. I don't think she was even talking about her fiction, but I'm starting the novel Ally Hughes Has Sex Sometimes by Jules Moulin.

In the end it was Harry's fault.
Harry Goodman  had promised to help Professor Hughes around the house that Friday. He'd also promised the Friday before and the Friday before that, too.
But it was New England and baseball season and 2004. The Sox were moving toward a ninety-eight, sixty-four record that spring and five months later, that October, they'd sweep the Cardinals to win their first Series in eighty-six years. 

I'm curious about what was Harry's fault, but I'm put off by all the numbers in the baseball paragraph. Hope I like it.

Tuesday Intros -- Finding Fontainebleau

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

This week, I'm reading Finding Fontainebleau by Thad Carhart. It's a memoir about an American boy growing up in Paris in the 1950s.

Here's the intro:

All these years later I can recall with keen precision the moment when the bottom dropped out, because that is exactly what it felt like: one moment we were flying, shaking a bit from turbulence, the next we were falling, in a calm, eerie quiet broken only by the sound of the four engines laboring uselessly. Then the air caught us again and it was bad: the plane pitched violently up and down, from side to side, every way imaginable. The passengers found their voice then, after the expectant dread of the free fall. This was active, maniacal horror, and people screamed. It was the first time I saw an adult -- many of them, in fact -- expressing fear without reserve. The woman across from us started to cry and yell, and there was nothing to be done but listen and watch with a kind of terrified fascination. 

This cliff-hanger opening leads to some calmer musings about life in post-war France and the experiences Carhart's family had adjusting to a move from suburban Virginia to Paris.

I look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading.

I'm also connecting with Paris in July.

Tuesday Intros -- The Runaway Wife

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

It's funny that the publisher contacted me about reviewing this novel, The Runaway Wife,  just as my own novel, Paris Runaway, was about to come out. I noted the similar title and the fact that they are both set in Europe.
I've read a book by this author, Elizabeth Birkelund, before and the writing blew me away, so it was an easy decision to read this one. The previous book I loved, also set in France, was The Dressmaker.  I'm about halfway through The Runaway Wife, so look for an upcoming review.

Here's the intro:

Jim Olsen, you are here. In Switzerland, walking on the rock ledges of the Swiss Alps. If this was not the end of the world, at least it felt like it. In this moonscape ten thousand feet high, in this land of rock and rock and more rock, and sky and sky and more sky, one misguided step and Jim could plunge from one of thousands of vertiginous, crusted cliffs. The only thing that reassured Jim that he was not on a planet in a far-flung galaxy was his ability, on this clear day, to pinpoint several small patches of green that resembled colored pieces in a stained-glass window -- these he knew to be farmland in the Swiss valley far, far below. 

I don't care for that first sentence where he's apparently speaking to himself in second person. I had to read it several times to figure it out, but the rest of the book is lovely.

I look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading.

I'm also connecting with Paris in July.

Tuesday Intros -- Paris Runaway

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I suppose you couldn't technically say that I'm reading this novel, since I wrote it, but still taking the time to share the intro with everyone, in hopes that you'll want to read it.
This is a fast-paced, romance, adventure, women's fiction novel. I think that's enough descriptors.
Sadie flies to Paris to retrieve her 17-year-old daughter who pursued a French exchange student across the ocean. Joining forces with the boy's father, Sadie feels stirrings she'd tamped down since her divorce two years before. Sparks fly as the parents try to keep their children out of trouble, chasing them to Marseille and back to Paris again.

Here's the intro:

Marseille, FrancePrologue
A gust of hot wind from the open door made the gray floor churn. I stood on the threshold staring at the billowing surface as I tried to comprehend how a floor could move.
A stronger breeze followed, and feathers, gray feathers, the color of the concrete surface, swirled into the air and then wafted down to land gently.
“Feathers?” I asked. “Was there some sort of slumber party in here?”
When I walked through this door above a run-down carryout in Marseille, France, I had expected to see my daughter Scarlett, and I’d already practiced the speech I’d give her for running away, across the ocean to Paris and then gallivanting to the South of France. But the feathers threw me. No Scarlett – just feathers.

 I look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading and hope you'll add this one to your to-be-read list. Here's the link on Goodreads and on Amazon. The book becomes available on Thursday, and you can enter to win a copy on Goodreads, or click the link on the top right of this blog.

Tuesday Intros -- The Wood Witch

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

I don't usually read fantasy, but this novella, The Wood Witch by Pepper Sparks, is set in the area
 where I went hiking last week, so I'm going to give it a try.
Here's the intro:

On a humid summer day in the Appalachian Mountains, Sadie Brown sat in a red booth at Finnegan's Diner with her son, Nicholas, sipping coffee and eating a piece of tart rhubarb pie. She watched the dark shadows boil in Red-Hawk pass, a growing plume threatening to consume the hollers and rifts around them. Sadie, a long-time resident of Richmond County, was the only person to see the rolling mass advancing upon Summerset, and a burnt odor permeated the sleepy town along a lonely mountain road name Black Lick.

I found this on Amazon for $2.99. I'm looking forward to reading it.

Tuesday Intros -- The Little French Guesthouse

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I'm reading a book on my Kindle that is very enjoyable. It's called The Little French Guesthouse by Helen Pollard. If I had to guess, I'd suppose that I found this book based on a post by French Village Diaries. Jacqui always stays up-to-date on the latest books set in France.
Emmy and her live-in boyfriend Nathan travel from London to rural France for a holiday at a B&B. As the book opens, Emmy runs to find the wife of the B&B couple because her husband is having a heart attack. What she finds is her boyfriend having sex with the wife.
The holiday obviously falls apart from there. The book has a lighthearted, chicklit tone as she deals with the end of her relationship and starts helping out at the B&B, immersing her in French life.
Here's the intro:

I wish I could tell you that it happened like it does in the movies. You know the kind of thing. The heroine standing proud, oozing restrained fury. The audience's satisfaction as she delivers a reverberating slap across her lover's face. Her dramatic but dignified exit from the screen.
Believe me, there was nothing dignified about it. All I did was stand there shaking, rage and adrenaline coursing through my body like rabid greyhounds, my mouth flapping open and shut as I tried to find the words. Any words. Even a simple sound of outrage would have sufficed, but all I managed was a pathetic squeak. 

I'll look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading.

Tuesday Intros -- The Arrangement

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
I found this book, The Arrangement by Ashley Warlick, at the library, and it looks like fun. Here's the intro.

She'd made it sound as though her husband would be joining them for dinner. She'd made it sound that way on purpose, and then she arrived alone, lifting her shoulders in a vague wifely gesture of disappointment, and maybe the gave the impression of upset. She'd thought about this moment since she learned Gigi would be out of town. She wanted Tim's attentions to herself for the evening, and she'd planned accordingly.
"I reminded Al a week ago," she said, "and then again this morning. I don't know what he's thinking half the time."
Tim leaned to kiss her cheek wrapped in his smoke, his trim dark suit, his sense of ease. His hair had always been white. "Well," he said. "Perhaps he'll join us later?"

Oh, my. Sounds a little dicey.
I'll look forward to seeing what you all are reading.

Tuesday Intros -- I Promise You This

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

I'm reading a book set in France for FranceBookTours. I'll be reviewing I Promise You This by Patricia Sands on May 20, and  there will be a book giveaway, so I hope you'll come back for that.
Here's the intro:

Rain pelted down.
The limo crawled along in a clog of traffic. For the most part, the rhythmic slap of the windshield wipers was all that broke the silence.
Philippe knew that Kat was struggling to keep her composure. He kept the conversation light and brief as they looked out from the backseat. "Now you see why I never take a taxi into Paris from the airport. At least with a hired car and driver, I don't have to watch the meter skyrocket if we get caught like this."
Kat nodded expressionless, staring straight ahead. She thought it fitting that the weather was as gloomy and dark as the feelings she was fighting.
When the familiar landmarks of the Left Bank came into view, her mood began to lift. She leaned her head back against the seat. Her hand nestled in Philippe's. 

I had to keep the intro going until we got to a definitely French part -- the Left Bank.
I look forward to seeing what everyone else is reading.

Tuesday Intros - Love From Paris

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
Alexandra Potter wrote Love From Paris about a young Brit who is stood up by her American

boyfriend on her birthday so she goes to stay with a friend in Paris.
Here's the opening:

OK, calm down, it's got to be here somewhere.Rushing around my bedroom, I grab hold of my make-up bag and start rifling through it. Which of course is completely futile. I mean, is it just me, or does anyone ever pu a lip gloss in their make-up bag? It's always stuffed in a coat pocket gathering fluff. Or lost in a random handbag. Or stuck down the back of the sofa, top off, smearing pink gloop everywhere...

This book is definitely chick lit, which I enjoy many times. I'm a little worried because the next step is the friend in Paris representing an apartment that has been  untouched for 60 years, which is what The Paris Apartment was about. This is obviously a different take on it.
Hope you're reading something fun.

Tuesday Intros -- Interior Designs

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

This week I'm starting a book by one of our fellow bloggers.  Laurel-Rain Snow. The book is Interior Designs. Here's the intro:

When I woke up, my thoughts sifted through my mind slowly, like pieces of a dream. I could feel the sun through the spaces in the blinds, and I gradually saw my surroundings -- my pink and white floral Laura Ashley spread, the matching shams, and other assorted pillows -- and that normally blissful feeling started to descend. And then something jarred me fully awake. I sat up slowly, and the heavy cloak of despair fell down around my shoulders. My now-familiar life began to take shape.
When had my world morphed into this despair that seemed to follow me into every waking moment? Why did my sleep bring my only peace these days?

 I look forward to reading Laurel's novel.

Tuesday Intros -- The Rivals of Versailles

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.

I'm reviewing The Rivals of Versailles by Sally Christie for FranceBookTours in April, just a few days after the book debuts on April 6. I previously reviewed The Sisters of Versailles, about five sisters who all became the mistress of King Louis XV. Here's my review for that one.
I'm only about a third of the way into this second book of the trilogy, but this one is even more gripping. Here's the intro:

The gypsy's hair is as red as blood, I think in astonishment. She catches me staring and starts, rabbit-like, as though she recognizes me. But she does not, and I certainly don't know anyone quite so dirty.
"I please you not to touch me," I say as she comes toward me, but still there is something familiar abut her. My mother bustles over, carrying a pastry in the shape of a  pig, and pulls me back from the grimy woman.
"Just look at those perfect eyes," says the woman. She takes my hand, a coarse brown mitt over my own, and I smell a mix of smoke and sweat. "A heart-shaped face. She is as pretty as a miracle, though no wonder with such a handsome mother. I'll you her fortune."

Hope you're reading something wonderful  too.

Tuesday Intros -- The Chocolate Temptation

Every Tuesday, Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea posts the first paragraph of her current read. Anyone can join in. Go to Diane's website for the image and share the first paragraph of the current book you are reading.
Reading one of Laura Florand's chocolate books is a bit like eating a box of chocolates. It's probably not the best thing for me, but it feels so good at the time. And they're usually set in France, so that's a bonus. French chocolates.
 I'm starting The Chocolate Temptation by Laura Florand. Sarah is an American intern in a Paris pastry kitchen and she hates then loves Patrick, one of the chefs.

She hated him. Tossing around dessert elements as if they were juggling balls he had picked up to idle away the time and, first try, had dozens flying around his body in multiple figure eights. Patrick Chevalier. Sarah hated him with every minute painstaking movement with which she made sure a nut crumb lay exactly the way Chef Leroi wanted it on a fnancier. She hated him with every flex of tendons and muscles in her aching hands in the evening, all alone in her tiny Paris apartment at the approach to Montmartre, knowing someoe else was probably letting him work the tension out of his own hands any way he wanted.

Unfortunately, the last book I read by Florand spent too much time in the characters' heads. I hope this one gets me out of their heads and into Paris.