We all know that Proust could conjure worlds by dipping hisfamous madeleine in a teacup. I foundthat listening and talking with mystery writer Cara Black, creator of theunstoppable, smart and thoroughly modern detective Aimée Leduc, had the sameeffect on me. Hearing Black’s memories, and wandering the shadowy streets anddark underbelly of Pariswith Aimée, sent my own memories wandering too.
Black regaled an audience of Left Coast Writers recentlywith how she first arrived in Parisas an eighteen-year-old wearing a lumberman’s jacket and boots and boldly wentunannounced to knock on the door of celebrated writer Romain Gary. Since he hadpolitely responded to a fan letter she’d written him, she figured he’d be happyto see her. My own first moment was also tinged with the ridiculous. LikeBlack, I had hitch-hiked all over, so for my arrival at age nineteen, mytransportation was by large truck. Joining the affable truck driver. in smokingGauloises, I decided I needed to look chic for my grand entrance in the City ofLight. So Iadded a skirt, hose and heels to my ensemble -- much enhanced I’m sure, by abattered suitcase.
I asked Black if, upon arrival, her French was actually upto the task of speaking with Romain Gary. She laughed and said her schoolingwith French-speaking nuns had given her a fluency and vocabulary that wasvintage end-of-nineteenth century. In that respect, I can match and raise herone. By the time I arrived, I had taken so many French lit. classes, anddevoured so much grammar, that a Parisian friend joked she loved getting myletters straight out of the eighteenth century. Tongue-tied and stumbling whenfirst trying to communicate, I’m sure I made a verbal leap straight to theMiddle Ages.
For both of us, that initial trip was indeed just abeginning, and we have returned to Parisover our lives for pleasure, for work and for love, because one never outgrowsthe ability to be besotted with Parisian charms.
Black spoke of taking her son there as a child, and hiscomplaints at being dragged to another museum. I remember the cry of my ownchildren, “no more churches,” and their happiness with an expedition I sentthem on. Like Aimée Leduc, who wears a Tintin watch, they were great Tintinfans. So without adult supervision, I sent them armed with a map, Metro tokens,some Euros and their middle-school French to the Tintin bookstore. A raggedcollection of taped-together Tintin books in French is still kicking around myhouse.
The ripples of similar experiences sparked by Black and herdetective go on and on. I, too, have written a novel, if not a mystery, basedon early experience in Paris, That ParisYear. But whereas I’m just working on a sequel, Black is the author of anacclaimed series of murder mysteries set in various Parisian neighborhoods. Hertwelfth, Murder at the Lantern Rouge,is just out. I can’t wait to read it. And to check out that little-known partof the Marais, where it is set, when I go with our group of travel writers to Paris in September.
