Amour Provence (30 page)

As an American living in Provence, that would have been a natural angle for you to take in a novel. Why did you decide not to go that route?

It is the French who interest me. I didn't have any desire to tell a story about an ex-patriate. I wanted to tell a story from the point of view of the people who grew up in the Midi, who have lived whole lives there. I hoped to give a special insight into how the Provençal think and feel.

Had you wanted to write a novel for some time, or was it a spontaneous decision to do so?

While I was living in France, I began several novels that took place in the US. But after a while I felt I was losing touch with my home country. I didn't have my finger on the pulse of American life anymore. When I began writing about France there was an immediate surge of life and I knew I was on the right track.

Why did you choose to structure
Amour Provence
the way that you did? What challenges, if any, did this present while you were writing the book?

I began writing first about individual characters, and then I realized that these people were not only close neighbors, but that their lives were intimately intertwined. Even though some
of these characters had wildly different stories and experiences, the
terroir
(the special location they live in), as the French call it, held them together—and held the novel together. All of them have a deep attachment to the land they come from, their French patrimony.

Which of the many compelling characters in the novel came to you first? Which one was the most interesting to create?

I loved Didier right from the beginning though he changed a lot as I wrote. At first, I thought he was a very discontented person who had a certain penchant for violence, but then I realized he was a much more evolved, and evolving, person than that. I also am extremely fond of Euphémie, who is so much a creature of the natural world. She reminds me of one of those Turgenev characters who romp through forests and don't really have a home. And I have a special feeling for Aurélien. I had three younger brothers, so teenaged boys have always been something I find interesting to write about.

One of the most gripping and poignant parts of the novel is Euphémie's recollection of events that took place during World War II when she was a teenager. How did you go about researching this aspect of the story?

I have been interested in World War II for a long time, especially the Holocaust. I'd read several nonfiction books about what happened in Provence during the war. And I'd heard a lot of stories from our neighbors. When a friend took me to a memorial erected for several young American pilots who had been shot down in 1944 in a vineyard near my house, I scribbled down their names in my notebook and began to
ruminate about how I might eventually incorporate that incident into a story. One of the young fliers was named Harry.

The book's epigraph is a lovely passage by poet Guillaume Apollinaire. Why did you choose this particular verse, and what does it reflect about
Amour Provence?
What is the
amour
,
or love, referenced in the title?

I felt those verses by Apollinaire reflected a certain longing for life and love that several of the main characters evince. I didn't realize while I was writing the novel that many of the stories are about love: platonic love; love of a parent for a child; marital love; a sort of distant, watchful, undemanding love like Lapin's love for Euphémie; and, of course, passionate sexual love.

Weather plays a significant role in the story and affects the characters' lives and livelihoods, including the mistral, a fierce wind that according to Jeannot “could drive anyone crazy.” Have you experienced the intense weather extremes in Provence firsthand?

Oh, yes! Anyone who lives in Provence has been nearly blown over by the mistral when it is at its fiercest—and there's nothing colder than a mid-winter mistral. Conversely, in the summer the sun can be so bright that it burns right into skin and bone. The locals rise early in order to get chores done, and they make sure to take a siesta during the midday hours to spare themselves that intense heat.

You previously worked in book and magazine publishing. What is it like being on the other side of the process now? What was your path to publication like?

It took me several years to write this novel, so that was quite different from fast-paced magazine publishing where we'd be churning out issues every month. But as an editor, I still remember the excitement I would feel when I picked up a manuscript and began reading something that I thought was really good. There's a magic to that. I hope my readers will feel it for
Amour Provence
.

What would you most like readers to know about
Amour Provence?

I wanted to impart a genuine feeling for what life is really like in Provence, its special atmosphere, the food, the people, the markets, the weather, the attitude toward life, the life of a small village, and sometimes the hard choices people have to make, choices that can sometimes enrich a life even when they are not easily made.

1. Winemaking is the livelihood of the Falque and Perra families and for many others in Provence as well. Tour a local vineyard to learn about the process, visit a local wineshop, or host your own tasting and uncork several different varieties of French wine.

2. Follow Berti's lead and have a Provence-themed picnic, serving foods similar to those she selects to share with Didier, like pâté, mushroom terrine,
jambon fumé
(smoked ham), and strawberry tarts. Or make
daube de boeuf
, beef simmered in wine and herbs, a regional specialty that's cooking on the stove when Berti arrives at her parents' home. You can find recipes for the savory dish at
epicurious.com
and
food.com
.

3. Have each member bring a color image of Provence, such as ones depicting the region's iconic lavender fields, olive groves, mountains, historic towns, and châteaux. Create a collage of the images to help set the scene for your discussion of
Amour Provence
.

4. Author Constance Leisure lives in Provence part-time. Visit her website (
constanceleisure.com
) and blog (
constanceleisure.wordpress.com
) to learn more about her and to follow along on her adventures in the region and beyond.

© VAN SON HUYNH

CONSTANCE LEISURE
began her career as a magazine editor in New York before moving to Paris with her husband and two young children, who were raised and educated there. While living in Paris she began writing both fiction and nonfiction about daily life in France. For the past twenty-five years she and her family have traveled to virtually every corner of the country. Early on, while on a trip to Provence to fill up the trunk of the family car with wine, they stumbled upon and purchased an old farmhouse with an enchanted garden in a small wine village in the Vaucluse. Little by little, the house in Provence became the center of her family life and her creative imagination.

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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2016 by Constance Leisure

Excerpt from “Mirabeau Bridge” from
Collected Poems 1943–2004
 by Richard Wilbur. Copyright © 2004 by Richard Wilbur. Reprinted by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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First Simon & Schuster paperback edition June 2016

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Book design by Ellen R. Sasahara

Cover design by Kimberly Glyder

Cover photograph by Mark Owen/Trevillion Images

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Leisure, Constance.

Title: Amour Provence : a novel / Constance Leisure.

Description: First Simon & Schuster paperback edition. | New York : Simon & Schuster, 2016.

Identifiers: LCCN 2015036324

Subjects: LCSH: Man–woman relationships—France—Provence—Fiction. | GSAFD: Love stories

Classification: LCC PS3612.E35925 A84 2016 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

LC record available at
http://lccn.loc.gov/2015036324

ISBN 978-1-5011-2228-6

ISBN 978-1-5011-2231-6 (ebook)