Many books have been written about or taken place in Paris, some of which have been thoughtful and original, well-constructed stories while others have been egregiously clichéd and overtly illusory, recreating the same scenes we’ve read and seen previously. You know the themes – strangers from different worlds meet and fall in love on the Pont des Arts, a country bumpkin becomes cultured, well-intentioned foreigners stumble into the French administrative hole yet find their shining light at the end of the tunnel with the help of charming and dapper Parisians and a culinary novice finds their life calling in the heart (kitchen) of the gastronomical capital. But few are able to depict the simultaneously whimsical and anachronistic image of Paris with words as so many have done with a camera or paintbrush.

David Downie, a San Francisco native whose curiosity for his adopted city has yet to wane after twenty-five years, has deftly woven thirty-one vignettes on the neighborhoods, characters and daily life of Paris with irreverent humor and elegant descriptions. In Paris, Paris: Journey into the City of Light, Downie offers insight to feed both the Paris of our imaginations and the Paris that has hitherto remained unknown.

What is the most amusing or surprising tidbit people may not know about the French?
Genetically speaking, they’re about as mixed and scrambled as any European population can get. Many of the notions held by certain rightwing exponents of “national identity”, especially notions based on national roots and “blood”, are amusingly ludicrous. The Francs were a Germanic tribe. The Burgundians were Scandinavian. Most of the great kings, queens, statesmen, artists, scholars and thinkers who have made France great were either of foreign or mixed stock. France is a wonderful nation of bastards!

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