New Book
From the moment Peter Mayle and his wife, Jennie, uprooted their lives in England and crossed the Channel permanently, they never looked back. Here the beloved author of A Year in Provence pays tribute to the most endearing and enduring aspects of his life in France–the charming and indelible parade of village life, the sheer beauty, the ancient history. He celebrates the café and lists some of his favorites; identifies his favorite villages, restaurants, and open-air markets; and recounts his most memorable meals. A celebration of twenty-five years of Provençal living–of lessons learned and changes observed–with his final book Mayle has crafted a lasting love letter to his adopted home, marked by his signature warmth, wit, and humor.
Reviews
“Full of thoughtful reflections and trenchant observations. . . . It’s wonderful to get to go on one more journey with [Mayle] and remember why we fell in love with him and his writing.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“Idyllic.” — USA Today
“A warm, nostalgia-soaked look at the place [Mayle] loved so dearly, packed with fond recollections of the pleasures of life in the region, from pastis to Pétanque.” — Travel + Leisure
“[Mayle’s] keen eye and wit are much on display.” — The Philadelphia Inquirer
“[A] well-loved writer’s contented recap of a life well lived. . . . Mayle set a new course for travel writing.” — Minneapolis Star Tribune
“Delightfully quaint anecdotes from the years since Mayle and his wife, Jennie, escaped office life in New York and London in the 1980s for ‘a simpler, sunnier life’ in Provence. . . . Composed in a uniformly bright and jocular voice, this is a breezy valedictory note for a much admired writer.” — Publishers Weekly
“A welcome, if bittersweet, victory lap. The book’s final sentences are particularly resonant of a life well lived: ‘I must go. Lunch is calling.'” — The New York Times Book Review
“Mayle takes readers back to the idyllic, slow-paced and occasionally befuddling world that [he] first wrote about in his best-selling memoir A Year in Provence. . . . [ My Twenty-Five Years in Provence] treads delightfully familiar ground for fans who succumbed to the charms of Mayle’s first book. The new volume transports readers to the South of France through the eyes of an Englishman who never ceases to marvel at the sunshine, fine food and sometimes inscrutable culture of his adopted turf.” –Associated Press
