A September Book Walk Along the Seine

Reading Ruth Reichl’s The Paris Novel

This past week I’ve been reading a novel that reminded me of all the reasons I chose Paris as my home, so today I’d like to take you for a September walk along the Seine and tell you all about it. Put on some comfortable shoes, wrap a scarf around your shoulders (a must for any Parisian promenade), and let’s stroll together on this bright afternoon, where the light lingers just a little longer over the water.

A city built around a river carries a different kind of heartbeat. The Seine is Paris’s pulse, steady and unhurried, calling me back again and again. Whenever I cross its bridges or wander its quays, my thoughts quiet down just enough for me to remember where I am, and why I’m here. The river’s surface reflects both the monuments and my own shifting moods, so that my Parisian story feels inseparable from its waters.

And as if in reply, Ruth Reichl’s The Paris Novel felt like a letter addressed directly to this version of myself—a story steeped in Parisian charm, written with the sensibility of a gourmand, and reminding me that reinvention often begins the moment you say yes to the unknown.

When Paris Calls, You Answer

In Reichl’s novel, Stella—the reluctant heroine—has grown up in the long shadow of her dazzling but neglectful mother. Only when her mother dies does she inherit, not a fortune, but an obligation: a journey to Paris. She arrives carrying old wounds, but the city answers in unexpected ways, opening doors she never thought she’d walk through.

I’ve always been a sucker for “pack your bags and change your life” stories. Not because of romantic comedies or social media clichés, but because this is precisely how my own life began here. I landed in Paris with two suitcases and a backpack: a new country, a language that I had studied intensely yet no university degree prepares you for the everyday spoken version of a language, not knowing a single soul in the city, with a Masters degree plan and an open heart.

Like Stella, I learned that the city itself can be an accomplice in transformation. The people that I met, the opportunities that came my way, the things I discovered about myself as I navigated this new life—everything felt like a gift. Yes, even the parts without a happy ending; they were invaluable experiences, and I wouldn’t be the person I am today without them.

Reading Paris Through Time

Turning Reichl’s pages, I slipped easily into a Paris I had never known—the Paris of the 1980s, two decades before our first meeting, three before it became my home. Her descriptions transported me across time, yet the echoes felt familiar. So much had changed, but the rhythm of the city, its appetite for beauty and discovery, was the same.

Paris, I’ve come to realize, gives you the version you’re willing to see. If you chase postcards, you’ll drown in crowds at Trocadéro. But if you follow the greengrocer from Amélie or a secondhand bookseller who seems pulled from the pages of your favorite novel, you might just stumble into their world. Every fruit stall you’ll approach with curiosity will reward you with a smiling vendor; every shop you’ll enter in search of a hidden treasure will guide you towards remarkable conversations and real-life discoveries. That’s how I walk the city: with curiosity as my compass.

The Language of Good Food

When I closed the final page of The Paris Novel, I knew exactly where it belonged on my shelves—next to Muriel Barbery’s Gourmet Rhapsody. They share the same devotion to the language of taste, the belief that food is never just sustenance but art, memory, revelation.

It’s no surprise, of course, coming from Reichl, one of America’s most celebrated food critics and author of several food memoirs (one of which is patiently waiting for me on my bedside table as we speak). Yet this always gets me: the joy that French gastronomy brings into people’s lives, the awakening it can spark when food becomes pure enjoyment, the exquisite connection between terroir and taste. This is one of France’s greatest gifts and what I never cease to admire in novels or memoirs that speak the language of good food.

Looking Straight into the Eyes of the City

Walking along the Seine this afternoon, each frame that I’m recording in my memory, each detail that catches my attention, tells the story of my attachment to the version of Paris I am intentionally seeking every single day. Of course there are less picture-perfect moments when you spend each day together—just like with every relationship. But this autumn, I’m looking straight into the eyes of the city, and the spark is still there, just like the first time we set eyes on each other.

I don’t know if I’ve ever grown out of love with it. There are certainly days when life seems to overshadow my enthusiasm. But there’s no better season than autumn to fall back in love with Paris, to remember why I packed those two suitcases in the first place, and why every morning I still feel grateful to call this city home.

And perhaps that is why I wanted to create something for you too—a way to share the quieter Paris I carry with me. My Parisian Reading Rituals is a free literary guide I’ve written as an invitation to linger with the city: to lose yourself in side streets, to sit with a book in a centuries-old café, to pause in a hidden garden where time itself seems to soften.

If you’d like to keep walking beside me, you can download it by clicking here.

The Journey Continues

Whether you find yourself walking along the Seine or discovering the hidden corners of your own city, remember that the most beautiful journeys often begin with a single book and the willingness to let it guide your steps. Take your stories out for a walk. Let them show you what you might have missed. Sometimes the most profound travel happens when we simply change the lens through which we’re looking.

Until next time, enjoy your reading and your autumnal rituals !