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They Eat Horses, Don't They?:The Truth About the French tells you what life in France is really like. Do the French eat horses? Do French women bare all on the beach? What is a bidet really used for? In this hilarious and informative book, Piu Marie Eatwell reveals the truth behind forty-five myths about the French, from the infamous horsemeat banquets of the nineteenth century that inspired an irrepressible rumor, to breaking down our long-held beliefs about French history and society (the French are a nation of cheese-eating surrender monkeys, right?). Eatwell lived in France for many years and made the most of long French weekends, extended holidays, and paid time off to sit on French beaches, evaluate the sexual allure of the French men and women around her, and, of course, scan café menus for horses and frogs. As a result, They Eat Horses, Don't They? reveals a fascinating picture of historical and contemporary France—a country that has both changed radically in the twenty-first century, but yet still retains much of the mystery, romance, and allure that has seduced foreigners for decades. Truth, as always, is stranger than fiction. . . .
******* A TIMES 'BOOK OF THE YEAR' ******* ***Shortlisted for the CWA Dagger for non-fiction*** 'A magnificent, meticulous and startling re-examination of a crime that haunts the world's imagination' Geoffrey Wansell, author of An Evil Love: The Life of Frederick West 'Eatwell writes brilliantly . . . [she] has finally offered [Elizabeth] Short a type of belated justice. Her book reads like a thriller' Sunday Times 'A compelling read, in both style and substance . . . A must-read for anyone with an interest in the Black Dahlia - or indeed any fan of the true-crime genre' Rod Reynolds, author of The Dark Inside 'Compulsively readable, impeccably researched and heart-rending at times . . . Sup...
Exploring a culture filled with arcane laws, historical incidents, and bizarre paradoxes, Piu Eatwell's follow up to her award-winning and critically acclaimed myth-buster They Eat Horses, Don't They is a delightful exploration of France's quirky, literary, and culinary heritage. From absinthe and catacombs to former French soccer player Zinedine Zidane, Eatwell leaves no stone unturned, taking readers off the beaten path to explore the kind of information that gets missed in guidebooks and 'official' information sources. Who could imagine, for example, that there is a village in France where UFOs are banned from landing? Or that there is a verifiable population of wild kangaroos in the forests surrounding Paris? These, and many other off-beat delights, are just some of the curiosities awaiting readers in this journey through byways and hidden treasures of this endlessly fascinating and paradoxical country. Full of the richness and variety of France beyond the platitudes, including recipes and charming illustrations, F is for France is an ideal gift book and a must-read for Francophiles and anyone with an interest in French travel and culture.
“We are a trading community, a commercial people. Murder is doubtless a very shocking offence, nevertheless as what is done is not to be undone, let us make our money out of it.” Punch.
The centuries-old, love-hate relationship with our closest neighbour has spawned a plethora of myths and stereotypes. In recent years our stock of received wisdom about the French – land of the sophisticated lover, the wine-fuelled lunch, the gitane-puffing philosopher, the hairy female armpit and the rebarbatively squalid toilet – has been replenished by a new generation of lifestyle myths: that French women don't get fat, that French children don't throw food, that their countryside has been colonized by Boden-clad, Volvo-driving Brits. In THEY EAT HORSES, DON'T THEY?, Piu Das Eatwell explores the background to, and the contemporary evidence for, 45 such myths. She finds that many of them are simply false, and that even those that are broadly true are rather more complicated than at first sight. In the course of her thorough – and thoroughly entertaining – investigations, we discover there is more to our enigmatic Gallic neighbour than 365 types of cheese, and that the reality of modern French life is very different from the myths that we create about it.
This new edition of the L.A. noir classic is released just in time to accompany the Brian De Palma film.
A deadly political rivalry that ended in two brutal executions...An intricate love triangle that altered the course of history...A religious revolution that changed the world... THE TREASURE... For two thousand years, an undiscovered treasure rested in the rocky wilds of the French Pyrenees. A series of scrolls written in the first century by Mary Magdalene, these startling documents hold the power to redefine the events and characters of the New Testament. Protected by supernatural forces, the priceless cache can only be uncovered by a special seeker, one who has been chosen for the task by divine providence - The Expected One. THE CHOSEN ONE... When journalist Maureen Paschal begins the research for a new book, she has no idea that she is stepping into an ancient mystery so complex and dangerous that thousands of people have killed and died for it. As a long buried family scandal comes to light, she can no longer deny her own role in a deadly drama of epic international consequences.
On a snowy January morning in 1889, a worried servant hacked open a locked door at the remote hunting lodge deep in the Vienna Woods. Inside, he found two bodies sprawled on an ornate bed, blood oozing from their mouths. Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria-Hungary appeared to have shot his seventeen-year-old mistress Baroness Mary Vetsera as she slept, sat with the corpse for hours and, when dawn broke, turned the pistol on himself. A century has transformed this bloody scene into romantic tragedy: star-crossed lovers who preferred death together than to be parted by a cold, unfeeling Viennese Court. But Mayerling is also the story of family secrets: incestuous relationships and mental instabilit...
A Book Riot Best Book of the Year Goodreads Choice Award Finalist (History/Biography) “It’s Downton Abbey meets The Addams Family in [this] delightfully offbeat history.” —Library Journal At the close of the Victorian era, as now, privacy was power. The extraordinarily wealthy 5th Duke of Portland had a mania for it, hiding in his carriage and building tunnels between buildings to avoid being seen. In 1897, an elderly widow asked the court to exhume the grave of her late father-in-law, T. C. Druce, under the suspicion that he’d led a double life as the 5th Duke. The eccentric duke, Anna Maria contended, had faked his death as Druce, and her son should inherit the Portland millions. Revealing a dark underbelly of Victorian society, Piu Marie Eatwell evokes an era when the rise of sensationalist media blurred every fact into fiction and when family secrets and fluid identities pushed class anxieties to new heights.
When we think of France we often evoke images of fine food and wine, the elegant boulevards of Paris, the chic beaches of St Tropez. Yet, as the largest country in Europe, it is a place of huge diversity. The idea of 'Frenchness' emerged from over 2000 years of history and it is a riveting story from Roman conquest to the present day. Cecil Jenkins tells the story of the formation of this nation through its people, great events and culture. Through this narrative he charts why the French began to see themselves as so different from the rest of Europe and why, today, they face the same problems of identity as many other nations.