Provence from A to Z

Provence has become a second home for the writer, who has organised his view of this peculiar, lavender-scented region in the form of a glossary of entries for his loyal and new readers. However, the choice of passwords is very personal – Readers will thus encounter a varied mix of themes that the author found most appealing, most bizarre, most amusing, most typical: Avignon bridge and the donkey, garlic and the roundabout, lavender and Parisians, winds and the corkscrew museum, gardens and pastis… Peter Mayle's collage of impressions and experiences, presented in his typical humorous style, with insight and great affection, connects the ubiquitous and inherent theme of France: food and drink.

One of the most important contemporary English writers was born in 1939 in England. At the age of 20 he moved to the USA, where he worked for fifteen years as a copywriter and later as a manager in an advertising agency. In 1974 he returned to England to devote himself fully to writing educational books for children. A few years later, he succumbed to the charms of southern France and moved with his third wife to Provence, where they renovated an old farmhouse in Lubéron. About this his " the big leak" from the big world, he wrote his book A Year in Provence (1989), which won the prestigious British Book Awards and soon became a worldwide bestseller.

Other successful books followed, which have been translated into more than twenty languages - e.g. Hotel Pastis (no. Hotel Pastis, 2004), A Dog' s Life (no. A Dog's Life, 2000 and 2004), Anything Considered (no. I'll Consider Anything But Marriage, 2001) or the prose Forever Provence.