"A chic and surreal soupçon of Gallic wit in which a bottle of vintage vin transports a set of loosely connected companions back to 1954."
Romantic, wry and fragrant with the intoxicating bouquet of la vie Parisienne, this book will brighten the greyest of days with Gallic charme and enchantement.
Paris, 2017, and Hubert invites a few associates to share a bottle of exquisite 1954 Beaujolais. Among his guests are American tourist Bob, and neighbour Julien. For Julien, 1954 has extra significance, for that was when an ancestor of his experienced “something extraordinary”. Namely, he sighted a flying saucer in a year that became known as “The Year of Flying Saucers” due to the prolific number of sightings. Next morning, each of Hubert’s guests themselves experience something extraordinary as they realise they’ve been transported to a Paris of the past, to a city in which citizens exchange lighthearted bonhomie on buses, and cafes allow patrons to “smoke with impunity”. Initially Bob amusingly muses that “despite globalisation, the French had not lost their soul!” Then it dawns on the wine-sharing group how they came to voyage through time: “when the flying saucer flew over, it changed the Saint-Antoine wine and since then whoever drinks it will go back to 1954”.
Despite enjoying a very pleasant sojourn in the past - encountering Audrey Hepburn in a bar, dining with Edith Piaf - the question is: how can they return to 2017? Driven by droll humour and romance, and with a miraculous climax, this is a fabulously full-bodied-book with crisply sweet undertones.
| Primary Genre | Humorous Fiction |
| Other Genres: |
A very special bottle of wine sends 4 neighbors back to 1950s Paris, where they each find the key to a happy future
"A glorious time-slip caper... Just wonderful" - Daily Mail
When Hubert Larnaudie, chair of the management committee at his Parisian apartment building, makes an out-of-character decision to invite some fellow residents to drink an exceptional bottle of 1954 Beaujolais, he has no idea of its unique properties.
The following morning, Hubert finds himself waking up in 1950s Paris, as do antique restorer Magalie, mixologist Julien, and Airbnb tenant Bob, who's visiting from Milwaukee. After their initial shock, the city of Edith Piaf and An American in Paris begins to work its charm on the time travelers, providing unexpected solutions to the problems they left in the future. Julien pines for Magalie; but she's too focused on the traumatic death of her parents when she was small to notice that he loves her. Bob's wife Goldie is stuck in a coma, and Hubert is obsessed with the foolish decisions that led his ancestors to lose the family fortune. Through chance encounters and the magic of one of Paris's golden eras, each time traveler will find the key they were looking for.
But, delightful as 1954 is, they need to work out how to get back to 2017 - because how will they live out a happy future if they're stuck in the past?
Vintage 1954 features in the following genres: Humorous Fiction, Historical Fiction, Fiction
Vintage 1954 is available in Paperback, Ebook
Vintage 1954 was written by Antoine Laurain and published by Pushkin Press
Vintage 1954 has 218 pages
£9.89
