{"product_id":"my-year-in-paris-with-gertrude-stein-a-fiction","title":"My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein: A Fiction","description":"\n\u003ctable align=\"center\" border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"2\" cellspacing=\"0\" width=\"100%\"\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd class=\"productDetailSmallElements\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003cb\u003eDeborah Levy pulls off something wonderful\u003c\/b\u003e . . . A delightful amalgam of a highly subjective literary biography and an urban caper in the City of Light, brightly seasoned with wit, wisdom and insightful literary criticism . . . With \u003ci\u003eMy Year in Paris\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003cb\u003eDeborah Levy has produced another fresh, stimulating book about attempting to find the 'there there, ' not just in Gertrude Stein but in life and literature\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e--Heller McAlpin, \u003ci\u003eNPR\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"The celebrated British author turns her keen observational and critical eye toward Stein, a writer that Levy feels has been criminally redacted from the canon of modernist masters that emerged at the turn of the 20th century. \n\u003ci\u003eMy Year in Paris With Gertrude Stein\u003c\/i\u003e, however, is anything but a dry-as-dust revisionist treatise.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Marc Weingarten, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"In the hands of \n\u003cb\u003ea master of her craft--a true successor to Stein\u003c\/b\u003e--the voices of the narrator and her subject merge into one. You are what you read.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Emily Watlington, \u003ci\u003eArt in America\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"As ever, Levy's writing is \n\u003cb\u003esubtle and wry \u003c\/b\u003e. . . There is \n\u003cb\u003ea cadence to these sentences, which move at the speed of ordinary life but showcase Levy's careful attention to the world around her\u003c\/b\u003e . . . Language, with all its playfulness, risk, and tender beauty, is the very essence of \n\u003ci\u003eMy Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein\u003c\/i\u003e. This seems an obvious point to make--Levy is a writer, after all--but \n\u003cb\u003eclearly, some writers have more fun with words than others do\u003c\/b\u003e. Levy uses language to dismantle and reimagine, to make the familiar seem novel and shiny.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Grace Linden, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"A lighthearted, free-associative novel about female friendship and literary inspiration. With the insight and curiosity that characterize her fiction ( \n\u003ci\u003eHot Milk\u003c\/i\u003e, \n\u003ci\u003eSwimming Home\u003c\/i\u003e) and her acclaimed memoirs, Levy examines rootlessness and expatriation, partnership and friendship, freedom and devotion to one's art. \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Julie Phillips, \u003ci\u003e4Columns\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"The clue is in the subtitle--'A Fiction'--but, as with all of Deborah Levy's lucid, elegant, wise and often slyly, dryly humorous work, this book is not \n\u003ci\u003enot \u003c\/i\u003eabout the writer Gertrude Stein . . . \n\u003cb\u003eHer use of language is precise, honed, entirely her own, delivering quick truths and observations that catch you off the cuff and dazzle\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Emily LaBarge, \u003ci\u003eThe Nerve\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Levy's writing [is] eccentric, intelligent, and capacious.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Susie Goldsbrough, \u003ci\u003eThe Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Levy, like Stein, is ambiguous. Like Stein, she plays with language and her sentences dazzle, yet their intent is much clearer. She both inhabits and challenges her subject . . . \n\u003cb\u003eAs a novel, it is as indomitable and earthy as Stein, yet elegant and piercing as only Levy can be\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--Catherine Taylor, \u003ci\u003eThe Times Literary Supplement\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"The brilliant Deborah Levy returns with a new novel that spills over the boundaries of its genre. On the fictional side is the unnamed narrator, discovering herself in the context of new friends, new experiences and a new country. But rising from this narrative is an exploration of a real life literary legend, as the narrator studies the life and work of the modernist icon Gertrude Stein. The result is \n\u003cb\u003ea stunning portrait of two time periods and two women, fictional and otherwise, seen through the lenses of each other\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―\u003ci\u003eGQ\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\" \n\u003cb\u003eDeborah Levy is that rare thing: an author who has mastered fiction and non-fiction\u003c\/b\u003e. Here she does each with a fictionalised account of real events in the life of the American writer Gertrude Stein. It sounds \n\u003cb\u003eimpossibly chic\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e―The Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Run away to Paris with this delightful adventure of friendship that follows narrator Deborah with friends Eva and Fanny as they cook, walk, read and ask who was Gertrude Stein? . . . \n\u003cb\u003eTruly a delight\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―\u003ci\u003eElle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Levy's writing is \n\u003cb\u003eeccentric, intelligent and capacious\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―Susie Goldsbrough, \u003ci\u003eThe Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"A witty scherzo of a 'fiction' . . . Eva may announce that the essay on Stein will never get written, but here it is-- \n\u003cb\u003eodd, inventive and wonderfully entertaining\u003c\/b\u003e--triumphantly proving her wrong.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―Lucy Hughes-Hallett, \u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Fans of Deborah Levy won't be disappointed by her latest novel, ostensibly an exploration into the life and work of American avant-garde poet and thinker Gertrude Stein, but at its heart, a story about how we choose to navigate our own lives and anxieties. You don't need to know much, if anything, about Stein to become immediately swept up in the story . . . Levy ruminates on the pleasures and sorrows of friendship and how our own stories evolve.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―Martha Alexander, \u003ci\u003eAnOther Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"A boundary pushing work of which the modernist would be proud . . . It is \n\u003cb\u003eplayful, experimental, formally innovative yet also grounded in a realist approach. It is original\u003c\/b\u003e . . . A compelling contemporary fiction.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e―Robin Styles, \u003ci\u003eThe Conversation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\" \n\u003cb\u003eLevy is one of few writers who find fresh ways to astonish with each project\u003c\/b\u003e. . . [ \n\u003ci\u003eMy Year in Paris\u003c\/i\u003e] promises more of that \n\u003cb\u003e Levy wizardry: bold structural swings and a freewheeling spirit\u003c\/b\u003e.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e-- \n\u003cb\u003eLit Hub (Most Anticipated)\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"An inventive meld of biography and novel . . . What emerges is a persuasive portrait of Stein--unfettered by corsets, curiously magnetic to men despite her queerness, a self-proclaimed genius who wanted to 'excavate the future' . . . [A] short, witty, intriguing work. A beguiling genre-splicer, strewn with questions and some answers.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e (starred review)\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"The novel comes alive in the narrator's riveting efforts to grapple with Stein's idiosyncratic life and work. There's much to admire.\" \n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Publishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eBiographical Note\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003eDeborah Levy\u003c\/b\u003e writes fiction, plays, and poetry. Her work has been staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company, broadcast on the BBC, and translated widely. She is the author of several highly praised novels, including \n\u003ci\u003eAugust Blue\u003c\/i\u003e, \n\u003ci\u003eThe Man Who Saw Everything \u003c\/i\u003e(long-listed for the Booker Prize), \n\u003ci\u003eHot Milk\u003c\/i\u003e and \n\u003ci\u003eSwimming Home\u003c\/i\u003e (both Man Booker Prize finalists), \n\u003ci\u003eThe Unloved\u003c\/i\u003e, and \n\u003ci\u003eBilly and Girl\u003c\/i\u003e; the acclaimed story collection \n\u003ci\u003eBlack Vodka\u003c\/i\u003e; a three-part autobiography, \n\u003ci\u003eThings I Don't Want to Know\u003c\/i\u003e, \n\u003ci\u003eThe Cost of Living\u003c\/i\u003e, and \n\u003ci\u003eReal Estate\u003c\/i\u003e; and, most recently, the collection \n\u003ci\u003eThe Position of Spoons: And Other Intimacies\u003c\/i\u003e. She lives in London and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher Marketing\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eLong-listed for the \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eAmerican Library in Paris Book Award\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cb\u003eIn contemporary Paris, a narrator and two companions explore the life and work of Gertrude Stein: a subversive imagining of a truly subversive female artist.\u003c\/b\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eOur narrator has a lot going on. Her friend Eva's cat is missing--also, she wonders, where is Eva's husband. Their other friend Fanny is barely around, and not because of her job in finance; she is tangled up with no less than three lovers. And Gertrude Stein is ruining the narrator's life. \n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eShe is trying to write an essay about Stein but it seems impossible. She knows too much and nothing at all about the leading avant-garde thinker of the early twentieth century. There are the facts: Gertrude Stein studied psychology at Harvard and medicine at Johns Hopkins, then quit; curated modern art in her rented apartment that would shake the world; wrote novels, plays, poetry, and libretti that are incoherent and brilliant; felt love at first sight for her daring wife, the subject of \n\u003ci\u003eThe Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas\u003c\/i\u003e. \n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBut so much is out of reach. How do we put ourselves together? What do we lose to become modern? What do we find beyond the limits of language? Only a book like this, only a book by Deborah Levy, \"an indelible writer [and] elliptical genius\" (Dwight Garner, \n\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e), could attempt such an investigation. It crashes through genre to form something distinctively, utterly new--an imaginative, entertaining, and scholarly manifestation befitting the genius at its center. This is \n\u003ci\u003eMy Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein\u003c\/i\u003e. \n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Citations:\u003c\/strong\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/span\u003e 04\/15\/2026 (EAN 9780374602079, Hardcover) - *Starred Review\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/span\u003e 04\/06\/2026 (EAN 9780374602079, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eBooklist\u003c\/span\u003e 05\/01\/2026 (EAN 9780374602079, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eShelf Awareness\u003c\/span\u003e 12\/30\/0001 (EAN 9780374602079, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eContributor Bio:\u003c\/strong\u003eLevy, Deborah\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cb\u003eDeborah Levy\u003c\/b\u003e, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, writes fiction, plays, and poetry. Her work has been staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company, widely broadcast on the BBC, and translated into fourteen languages. Her works include the novels \n\u003ci\u003eHot Milk\u003c\/i\u003e and \n\u003ci\u003eSwimming Home\u003c\/i\u003e (both Man Booker Prize finalists), \n\u003ci\u003eThe Unloved\u003c\/i\u003e, and \n\u003ci\u003eBilly and Girl\u003c\/i\u003e; the story collection \n\u003ci\u003eBlack Vodka\u003c\/i\u003e; and the non-fiction Living Autobiography Trilogy: \n\u003ci\u003eThings I Don't Want to Know\u003c\/i\u003e, \n\u003ci\u003eCost of Living\u003c\/i\u003e, and \n\u003ci\u003eReal Estate\u003c\/i\u003e. She lives in London.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/table\u003e\n","brand":"Farrar, Straus and Giroux","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51496247329046,"sku":"9780374602079","price":32.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0857\/9910\/8886\/files\/9780374602079.jpg?v=1783058152","url":"https:\/\/lusper.myshopify.com\/products\/my-year-in-paris-with-gertrude-stein-a-fiction","provider":"Lusperbooks","version":"1.0","type":"link"}