Kate & Frida: A Novel of Friendship, Food, and Books - Softcover

Buch 2 von 2: Love & Saffron Series

Fay, Kim

 
9780593852408: Kate & Frida: A Novel of Friendship, Food, and Books
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0593852400 ISBN 13: 9780593852408
Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2026

Inhaltsangabe

INSTANT USA TODAY BESTSELLER

“A highly original, heart-warming story of an extraordinary friendship.” —Amy Poeppel, Award-Winning author of The Sweet Spot

For fans of The Correspondent by Virginia Evans and 84, Charing Cross Road, a bright and comforting novel following the surprising friendship between two young women in 1990s Seattle and Paris, celebrating the last days before the internet changed everything.

Sometimes a book can change your life...

Twenty-something Frida Rodriguez, daughter of Love & Saffron’s own Joan Bergstrom, comes to Paris in 1991, relishing the city’s butter-soaked cuisine and seeking her future as a war correspondent. But when she writes to a bookshop in Seattle, she receives more than just the book she requests. A friendship begins that will redefine the person she thought she wanted to become.

Seattle bookseller Kate Fair is transformed by Frida’s free spirit, spurred to kiss her handsome coworker, to believe in herself as a writer, and to find beauty even in loss. Through the most tumultuous years of their young lives—personally and globally—Kate and Frida’s friendship sustains and nourishes them as they show each other how to overcome self-doubt and the necessity of embracing joy even through our darkest hours.

A buoyant, mouth-watering oasis of a novel, Kate & Frida is a love letter to bookshops and booksellers, to the way stories shape how we perceive ourselves, to the passion we bring to life in our twenties, and to the last precious years before the internet changed everything.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Born in Seattle and raised throughout Washington state, Kim Fay is the author of the national bestseller Love & Saffron and Edgar Award–nominated The Map of Lost Memories. A former independent bookseller, she lived for many years in Vietnam, the inspiration for Communion: A Culinary Journey Through Vietnam. Fay now lives in Los Angeles with her musician husband, Jim Vitale, and their dog, Mabel.

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Frida Rodriguez ... En Route

October 2, 1991

Paris, France

Bonjour Puget Sound Book Company!

Greetings from my midnight view at Hôtel La Louisiane. Ivory moonlight glinting off zinc rooftops. An autumn chill in the air and me at my desk - cocooned in a baggy sweater à la Julie Christie in Doctor Zhivago - as I continue to hunt for a book. Naturally! Why else would I be writing to you? I spent the whole day with my new pal Kirby scouring the City of Lights. Of course we hit the venerable Shakespeare and Company and gave Village Voice a chance and the bookstalls too - only to discover that this magnifique metropolis is awash in macho old Hemingway but good luck finding his better half.

I need Martha Gellhorn's The Face of War!

Normally I'd order from my beloved Vroman's in L.A. but Kirby won our contest for finding to-die-for moules marinières. Now I have to do something he tells me to do and he's telling me to order Martha from you - we've been debating bookstores for almost a week and he claims you're #1. He's from Seattle - clearly biased - no offense. That said, I'm a card-carrying bookstore addict and I intend to try as many as I can before I die. I've been keeping a list since I was six and I can't wait to add you to it.

I'm enclosing a traveler's check. It should be enough to splurge for air mail. See address below.

Thank you and au revoir!

Frida Rodriguez

Hôtel La Louisiane

60 rue de Seine

75006 Paris, France

P.S. Sorry about the splotches. My éclair sprung a leak!

The Puget Sound Book Company

101 South Main Street Seattle, WA 98104

10/14/91

Dear Frida,

My name is Kate Fair. I'm not the one who opened your letter, but I was told I'm the only person here who's perky enough to respond to you. It's not midnight (the store closes at eleven), and I don't have romantic rooftop views, but it's nice here at night, too. I'm at the information desk, which is actually two big old desks facing each other on a low platform in the middle of the store. When it gets really quiet like now, it feels like I walked through the wardrobe into Narnia, but instead of magical creatures I find magical books in big quiet caverns with creaking wood floors and soaring brick ceilings. It smells homey like my Bumpa's trailer because there's a café in the basement with coffee brewing all the time. We can have as much as we want for free.

Confession: When The Face of War arrived I was just going to peek at the first few pages, but I couldn't put it down. Talk about awesome eye-opening. My brain is jittering with wars I've never even heard about. I was careful, but I guess it's technically a used book now. I gave you my employee discount to make up for it and hopefully keep the store from losing #1 status with your friend Kirby.

How awesome exciting to live in Paris. When I was in junior high I had a poster of the Eiffel Tower on my wall. I planned to live in a garret in Montmartre. Obviously that didn't happen. How did you end up in France? Where are you en route to? How many moules marinières did you have to eat to find to-die-for? How many bookstores have you been to? (I'm a bookstore addict, too. I just looked up Shakespeare and Company in a Time Out guidebook in our travel section and added it to my wish list.) Sorry for all the questions. I hope you don't mind. If you do, don't feel like you have to answer.

If you need more books, I promise I won't read them first. Your credit is on your receipt.

Sincerely,

Kate

Frida Rodriguez ... En Route

October 30, 1991

Paris, France

Bonjour Perky Kate!

I come to you once again from midnight and my rooftop view. Sometimes I still can't believe I'm in Paris - that's why I end up wide awake half the night waiting for dawn so I can go out and make more discoveries. It's not like L.A. where you need a car to go everywhere - it's fun to walk here. Today Kirby and I accidentally stumbled on one of those risqué art films at Le Champo - no need for subtitles there! - followed by overindulgence at a kebab shop in the Saint-Michel district. And the Metro! It's like the transporter in Star Trek - beam me to the Moulin Rouge, Scotty! Tomorrow we're going to decide whether or not we approve of the Louvre Pyramid and the Centre Pompidou.

Merci for the book and the discount - no biggie about reading Martha before you sent her. I'm sitting here on my bed with a croissant and a glass of Beaujolais and I've already spilled wine on the cover and there's butter soaked through the introduction. No one does butter like the French - parfait!

So what's Frida Rodriguez doing in Paris besides not sleeping? She's en route to her future! It started last year when I read that Time article about twentysomethings. The part about mass apathy got to me and when that writer called us the New Petulants I had an epiphany. Not even twenty-five and I was on my fourth writing job - and I'd whined about every one of them! Even worse, the aforementioned fourth job was with West Coast Commerce disguising advertorials as financial news. I blame that one on my fleeting Ayn Rand phase in college. By the way - "Greed is good" is the stupidest thing a person can say!

Anyway I'm thinking - seriously Frida! Why'd you even bother getting a journalism degree? That's when it hit me. Get out of L.A. and pursue my dream of writing something meaningful. So I saved up my money and came to Paris - just like Martha back in her day - to see the world and be close to all the history in the making around here. Is this letter sounding like the unabridged version of a personal ad in the back of the L.A. Times? Single brownish-whitish girl, nonsmoking, loves kebabs and long walks on the beach, tired of yuppies and New Petulance and wants to do something of consequence before she wakes up one day and she's thirty and it's too late!

How's that for a slapdash answer to your questions? My problem is I can type on my mom's old très chic portable Hermes Rocket faster than I can think. Well one of my problems. To spend that credit - what are you reading right now that you absolutely LOVE? Surprise me! I play this game with my dad when we go to bookstores. We tell them a little about ourselves and then rate the store by the surprise.

Au revoir!

Frida

P.S. Nothing wrong with being Perky Peggy. I'll take it over Gloomy Gertie any day.

P.S. Deux. Adding Paris, I've been to thirty-six different bookstores in my life so far, mostly in L.A. and Mexico.

P.S. Trois. I almost forgot to explain the moules marinières competition. Fellow American Kirby Olsson is on an exchange from the University of Washington at l'École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Paris-Belleville - how's that for a mouthful! He lives here at the hotel too and I discovered he's a Fellow Glutton. I told him about some disappointing moules marinières I had and he said he heard where to get good ones but it turned out they were just decent and that set off our contest. We each chose five restaurants and may the best moules marinières win! Kirby hit on to-die-for at Chez Lisette - a cozy bistro a few blocks from the hotel with a view of the Seine to boot - and that is how I wound up ordering Martha from his favorite bookstore. You're officially added to my list but I'll wait to rate you until I receive my surprise. No pressure!

The Puget Sound Book Company

101 South Main Street - Seattle, WA 98101

11/15/91

Dear Frida,

Paris sounds awesome divine. I totally admire you for following your dream. I'm pretty much trying to do that, too. My dad and I have a thing for bookstores like you and your dad, and when I was growing up he'd do these special daughter...

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Verlag
Penguin Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2026
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593852400
ISBN 13 
9780593852408
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
321
Kontakt zum Hersteller
preigu GmbH & Co. KG
mail@preigu.de

Lengericher Landstr. 19
Osnabrück
Niedersachsen
49078
Deutschland

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