About this item
On a tiny French island, a couple of American dreamers redefine their lives by restoring a ruinxwhich in this lovely, shimmering story becomes a parable of a saner, greener, more sustainable path that we all can follow if we will but listen to the wisdom of the villagers the way the Wallaces did. The French House moves to a soulful, very funny rhythm all its own.xMeryl Streep A brave, insightful, and very amusing memoir about a fantasy that many of us have had but not dared to attempt.xJane Smiley When life hands you lemons, make citron pressxE. Shortly after Don and Mindy Wallace move to Manhattan to jump-start their writing careers, they learn of a house for sale in a village they once visited on a tiny French island off the Brittany coast. Desperate for a life change, the Wallaces bravely and impulsively buy it almost sight unseen.
About the Author
DON WALLACE latest book is THE FRENCH HOUSE: An American Family, a Ruined Maison, and the Village that Restored Them All (Sourcebooks, June 3) . It's a memoir of over 30 years that he and his wife Mindy have spent on a tiny island off the coast of Brittany called Belle Ile. They first visited the island as wandering writers in 1980, and were lured by a siren (actually, a former college abroad professor of Mindy's at Stanford) into buying a house in her village.
It turned out to be a ruin. It nearly ruined their finances for 7 years and yet the simultaneous immersion in their romantic Breton passion and the realities of family and work life back in New York City taught them lessons about themselves and dreams in general. Over the 35 years covered by the story, change and revelations abound, joys and challenges rise unexpectedly; as much as they learn from the rural villagers of the Cote Sauvage, they also find amusing wisdom from the collection of Parisian psychiatrists who begin buying houses in the villages around them. (The beach therapy sessions are priceless.) In return, they introduce baseball, BBQ, guacamole, and in particular surfing--excerpts from THE FRENCH HOUSE have appeared in Islands and Hana Hou! and one is forthcoming Surfer's Journal.
Meryl Streep calls it: "A lovely, shimmering story... The French House moves to a soulful, very funny rhythm all its own."
DON WALLACE has written fiction and non-fiction, journalism, films, reviews and opinion pieces, even the odd poem and song. He writes about a number of diverse environments: France, surfing, military history, business and entrepreneurs, the boating world, bass fishing, high school football, civil rights and Hawaiian music. He has been a magazine editor at Time Inc, Hearst, the New York Times, and Conde Nast and was most recently Film Editor at The Honolulu Weekly. From Long Beach, Calif, he attended Long Beach Poly, UC Santa Cruz, and the Iowa Writers' Workshop; with his wife Mindy Pennybacker (The Green Guide, DO ONE GREEN THING) he lived in New York City for 27 years before returning to Mindy's native Honolulu in 2009. Their son Rory Wallace lives in Manhattan.
DON WALLACE published A TIDE IN TIME: The Log of Matthew Roving, Book One on Kindle in 2014. This YA novel, a time-traveling tale of the American Revolution, is an expansion of his award-winning serialized novel that ran for 3 years in Naval History Magazine, published by the U.S. Naval Institute of Annapolis. Wallace received Author of the Year honors for the novel in 2002 and even addressed the Joint Chiefs of Staff, where he thanked the examples of his father, USNA 46, and grandfather Wallace, youngest chief petty officer at age 19 in 1917.
Don's last book in print and Kindle was ONE GREAT GAME: Two Teams, Two Dreams, in the First-Ever High School National Championship Football Game (Atria, 2003; paper 2004; Kindl
