Take Five: Sophie Masson and THE PARIS COOKING SCHOOL

We are thrilled to bring you an interview with longtime WU contributor, Sophie Masson, for a sneak peek at her new adult novel, The Paris Cooking School (written under the name of Sophie Beaumont), which comes out in the US and Canada on August 6, published by Alcove Press. The novel first came out in Sophie’s native Australia in November 2023, and received great reviews (including a full page in Australian hottest women’s magazine). The book was subsequently sold to North America, Portugal (where it’s just come out), Germany, and Ukraine.

There are two additional bits of exciting news in advance of the publication here in the states and in Canada. First, North American audio rights have just been sold. Also, Barnes and Noble is including it in their fabulous Sale for the Pages pre-order promotion, which is already in progress, running from July 10 to July 17. It’s all looking very promising in the lead up to publication!

Want to know more? Read on:

Q1: What’s the premise of your new book?

SM: My book, The Paris Cooking School (written under the pen-name of Sophie Beaumont) is an adult contemporary novel set, you guessed it, in Paris 😊 It features three main characters, Kate Evans, Gabi Picabea and Sylvie Morel, who are all at crossroads in their lives. Gabi and Kate have both come for the month-long course at Sylvie’s Paris Cooking School, after major crises in their lives—in Kate’s case, a bitter marriage breakup, in Gabi’s case a crippling creative block. Meanwhile, Sylvie is facing a worrying online harassment campaign targeting her business, and trouble from her commitment-shy lover Claude. What the three women find during that extraordinary April in Paris will change the course of their lives—and bring new love, too. Set against a gorgeous background of Paris in spring, and studded with delicious references to French food, it’s a novel that Australian readers have already taken to their hearts, and which I hope North American readers will just as much! The book comes out in the US and Canada on August 6, published by lovely Alcove Press.

Q2: What would you like people to know about the story itself?

SM: This is a story that gave me immense pleasure to write—it combines so many things about my heritage, my experience, my interests—and I am delighted that it’s already given other people so much pleasure to read. It’s a joyful, hopeful novel, even though it doesn’t shy away from the real difficulties and challenges that life throws up. It’s a novel of second chances, of finding yourself in a magical city. It’s a novel to savour and relish on a long summer’s day—or any day, come to that!

Q3: What do your characters have to overcome in this story? What challenge do you set before them?

SM: They have to overcome many things, amongst them betrayal by those nearest to them, online trolling, misunderstandings, crises of confidence…but in the end, they overcome them, not always in the ways you might expect!

Q4: What unique challenges did this book pose for you, if any?

SM: I have to say this book was such a joy to write that I can’t really think of any particular challenges I faced: for me it combined perfectly my dual French and Australian experiences and it felt completely natural as a storyworld. And I loved my characters!

Q5: What has been the most rewarding aspect of having written this book?

SM: It just expressed exactly what I wanted to say with it—and it has resonated so strongly with so many readers, more than any other book I’ve ever written. That has been extraordinary—and humbling, in the best possible way. I hope that readers in the US and Canada will love it just as much–I’ve already seen a couple of advance reviews, and they’ve been lovely, so that’s very promising!

Congratulations on your new book, Sophie! Thank you for sharing this great sneak peek today.

WU Community, you can learn more about Sophie’s novel on her website, or by following her on Facebook or IG, or by following the buy-links below. Read on! 

Writer Unboxed

Writer Unboxed began as a collaboration between Kathleen Bolton and Therese Walsh in 2006. Since then, the site has grown to include ~50 regular contributors and a variety of guests on rotation throughout a given year.

In 2016, the Writer Unboxed team published a book with Writer’s Digest / Random House. AUTHOR IN PROGRESS: A No-Holds-Barred Guide to What It Really Takes to Get Published is a comprehensive guide focused on helping writers over/around/through hurdles faced at every stage of the novel-writing process. It’s received some ***** reviews; we hope you’ll check it out.

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