La Belle Saison: Living Off the Land in Rural France

by PatriciaAtkinson (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2006

  $4.74

  Patricia Atkinson moved to rural France as an outsider hoping to put down roots. But her dream turned to tragedy as her husband James became ill and died. It was then she realized that the small vineyard they had bought together was her sole means of support. 'La Belle Saison' tells her story.

• Used

  Paperback
  2006

  $3.27

  How often have you eaten a mushroom that you picked yourself that morning? Or sat on a boat opening and eating oysters as you lift them from the sea? Or partaken of a seven course feast of game to celebrate the success of the chasse? When Patricia Atkinson - bestselling author of The Ripening Sun - first moved to France, her intention was simply to establish a vineyard. Over the years, however, she found herself becoming integrated into a way of life that, had she stayed in England, she would hardly have believed existed. Grounded in the rhythms of the land and the seasons, daily life in Patricia's south-western corner of France is dictated by a series of rituals and celebrations that we have long lost in our supermarket age. La Belle Saison is Patricia's eulogy to this way of life: a testament to the timelessness of the beautiful French countryside, the bounty of the land, and the generous-hearted French neighbours who showed Patricia that a simple life has many rewards. In France, every season is 'la belle saison', offering up its gifts to those willing to appreciate and look after the land.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2005

  $3.27

  Fifteen years ago, Patricia Atkinson came to rural France as an outsider hoping to put down roots. But her dream turned to tragedy as her husband James became ill and left her. It was then she realized that the small vineyard they had bought together was her sole means of support. As she described in her bestselling The Ripening Sun, in the years that followed she did eventually achieve a dream, but one far removed from the one she first imagined. She learned to live off the land, joining in a French rural tradition that went back through history, that connected her to a distant past. Her property, Clos D'Yvigne, went on to win countless awards and she is regarded as one of France's leading vignerons. But what of the woman behind this success story? What sustained her through years of loneliness and adversity apart from a single-minded determination to succeed? La Belle Saison will tell of her life after James, of further tragedies, of friendship lost and gained. It will show where Patricia found solace: in the timelessness of the beautiful countryside, the bounty of the land and through the generous-hearted French neighbours who showed her that a simple life has many rewards: hunting for wild boar and truffles in the Autumn, summer days fishing, or collecting oysters, the eternal round of the vineyards. In France, every season is 'la belle saison', giving up its gifts. La Belle Saison is a captivating celebration of one woman's achievement of a dream over adversity.