{"product_id":"swimming-in-paris-a-life-in-three-stories-9780593833933","title":"Swimming in Paris: A Life in Three Stories","description":"\u003cb\u003eA Natalie Portman Book Club Pick \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"Sinewy, tough, sharp . . . Even though Schneck works at a scale that is deliberately small, insistently concrete, and extremely lean, her writing somehow exposes whole vistas of the female experience.\" --\u003cb\u003eKatie Roiphe, \u003ci\u003eThe Atlantic\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eFrom the award-winning and bestselling French author Colombe Schneck, a woman's personal journey through abortion, sex, friendship, love, and swimming \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eAt fifty years old, while taking swimming lessons, I finally realized that my body was not actually as incompetent as I'd thought. My physical gestures had been, until then, small, worried, tense. In swimming I learned to extend them. I saw male bodies swimming beside me, and I swam past them, I was delighted, my breasts got smaller, my uterus stopped working. My body, by showing me who I was, allowed me to become fully myself. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eSeventeen, Friendship, and Swimming\u003c\/i\u003e, Colombe Schneck orchestrates a coming-of-age in three movements. Beautiful, masterfully controlled, yet filled with pathos, they invite the reader into a decades-long evolution of sexuality, bodily autonomy, friendship, and loss.\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eSchneck's prose maintains an unwavering intimacy, whether conjuring a teenage abortion in the midst of a privileged Parisian upbringing, the nuance of a long friendship, or a midlife romance. \u003ci\u003eSwimming in Paris\u003c\/i\u003e is an immersive, propulsive triptych--fundamentally human in its tender concern for every messy and glorious reality of the body, and deeply wise in its understanding of both desire and of letting go.\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eColombe Schneck \u003c\/b\u003eis the author of eleven books of fiction and non-fiction, she has received prizes from the Académie Française, Madame Figaro and the Society of French Writers. The recipient of scholarships from the Villa Medicis in Rome and the Institut Français, as well as a Stendhal grant which allows French writers to do research and write abroad, she also spent fifteen years as a broadcaster for Canal Plus, France TV and Radio France. She was born in Paris in 1966 where she still lives, is a graduate of Sciences Po and Université de Paris II with a degree in Public Law. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eLauren Elkin\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of several books, including \u003ci\u003eArt Monsters: Unruly Bodies in Feminist Art \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eFlâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London\u003c\/i\u003e, a BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week, a \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e Notable Book of 2017, and a finalist for the PEN\/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay. Her essays on art, literature, and culture have appeared in the \u003ci\u003eLondon Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eGranta\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eHarper's\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eLe Monde\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eLes Inrockuptibles\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eFrieze\u003c\/i\u003e, among other publications. She is also an award-winning translator, most recently of Simone de Beauvoir's previously unpublished novel \u003ci\u003eThe Inseparables\u003c\/i\u003e. After twenty years in Paris, she now lives in London. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eNatasha Lehrer \u003c\/b\u003eis a writer, translator, editor, and teacher. Her essays and reviews have appeared in \u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Observer \u003c\/i\u003e(London), \u003ci\u003e The Times Literary Supplement\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003e The Nation\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003e Frieze\u003c\/i\u003e, and other journals. As literary editor of the \u003ci\u003eJewish Quarterly \u003c\/i\u003eshe has worked with writers including Deborah Levy, George Prochnik, and Joanna Rakoff. She has contributed to several books, most recently \u003ci\u003eLooking for an Enemy: 8 Essays on Antisemitism. \u003c\/i\u003eShe has translated over two dozen books, including works by Georges Bataille, Robert Desnos, Amin Maalouf, Vanessa Springora, and Chantal Thomas. In 2016, she won the Scott Moncrieff Prize for \u003ci\u003eSuite for Barbara Loden\u003c\/i\u003e by Nathalie Léger. She lives in Paris.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Penguin Publishing Group","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51325360406802,"sku":"9780593833933","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_5b109197-d1a6-440b-bcc9-f6392aed33cf.jpg?v=1767094801","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/swimming-in-paris-a-life-in-three-stories-9780593833933","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}