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his foreword, Maurice Druon, of the Académie Française, writes that “Horne is everywhere and knows everything.… Nothing escapes his paintbrush”—which indeed appears to be true when reading this magnificent book. Druon also calls the book “in itself, a monument,” an endorsement with which I wholeheartedly agree. Horne explains in the preface that in the course of working on nine previous books on French history over three decades, he kept a “discard box” of little details on Paris (as Churchill is said to have done during World War II), and that box became a scrapbook of sorts as well as the origin of this book. With inserts of photographs and reproductions, this is a de rigueur read.

The Locals’ Point de Vue

“There is a world of difference between the Paris of tourism and Parisians’ Paris,” notes Bill Gillham in Parisians’ Paris (Pallas Athene, 2008), which is a great book for anyone visiting Paris but especially so perhaps for repeat visitors, as Gillham has purposefully made only summary reference to the obvious sights. However, he does include such topics as making hotel reservations, bathrooms, special trips for children, and free concerts and classic films. He really does cover all the bases. He also wisely urges caution when reading articles that have titles like “Secret Paris” and “Hidden Paris.” The Saint-Germain quarter, for example, “is the most intensively scrutinized sector of Paris. Even outside the main tourist areas, can anything have escaped the city’s five or six million visitors a month and those who write guides for them? The answer is that Paris is always changing, at the same time always contriving to remain the same. The cliché is right: the process of getting to know the city is never finished. And so the first-time visitor is only to a degree at a disadvantage, as guide writers driven by the demon of updating know to their cost.”

A Parisian’s Paris by Philippe Meyer (Flammarion, 1999) is, despite the similar title, not a guidebook but a “wish” for anyone who picks it up to decide to visit Paris in what he refers to as the “fifth season,” known as la rentrée, the time of year at the end of summer when Parisians return home from wherever they’ve been for the month of August. La rentrée, as Meyer defines it for this book, exists only in Paris; it lasts for an unpredictable length of time—he’s witnessed it for a full ten days or for a mere forty-eight hours—and it ends without warning. It’s identified by subtle, unexpected changes, such as: “If someone runs toward a bus stop just as the bus is leaving, the driver waits and reopens the door.” It is a time when Parisians “reclaim possession and awareness of their city, once again struck by a beauty they had managed to overlook, by the realization that Paris is still a miracle. Filled with pleasure and pride, Parisians delight in sharing their contentment. They know full well they couldn’t live anywhere else. That’s the time to visit the capital, because it’s the one moment when Paris and the Parisians show themselves at their best.” Meyer, a well-known radio commentator, presents an urban chronicle that is critical, affectionate, and revealing.

A Traveller’s History of Paris, Robert Cole (Interlink, 1998). This edition is one in a great series for which I have much enthusiasm. It’s a mini “what you should know” guide that’s small enough and light enough to carry around every day, and every edition in the series highlights the significant events and people with which all visitors should be familiar.

Vie et Histoire

I first read about the Vie et Histoire series—a twenty-volume encyclopedia about the city of Paris, one volume for each arrondissement—in Travelers’ Tales Guides: Paris. I’ve been slowly collecting the volumes over the years—though I’m still missing the seventh arrondissement, which is the one I most covet—and I hope I’m fortunate enough to acquire them all. These hardcover books, all in print in French (so it takes me a while to read them, dictionary in hand), each include these categories: histoire, anecdotes, célébrités, curiosit