I regularly read books in French, and I enjoy being able to do an activity that I like in my native language, in my target language as well.
But, sometimes I don’t have the time or the money/access. French novels do take me a little longer to finish reading- sometimes I don’t get as sucked in to the writing or the storyline as much, but I still want to finish the book. Sometimes a book that would be a cute pocket paperback in English, is a solid 500 pages in French, which takes time to get through. Certain books I can access for free through a local or university library, or even a free library site online if they’re in the public domain. I like to buy paperbacks when I travel to France (lightweight and easy to squish into a suitcase). Occasionally I’ll buy e-books when I’m not traveling, like right now. But French books can be expensive to have shipped to the US, so I try not to buy them in this way as often.
Lately, I’ve been reading French book reviews online! This is a good alternative. The book reviews are generally only a paragraph to a page in length. There are lots of different kinds of reviews out there as well- more literary analysis types, or more would-you-enjoy-reading-this types. I can also keep up with books that might be talked about in everyday conversation. One that might be really popular and well-known, or one that might be over-hyped but all of les français have at least heard about it.
I might not have the time or means to read all of these books, but it interests me to read the reviews or summaries about them. I haven’t really gotten into booktube (book related content creators on youtube), but I like to read blogs and I also follow a handful of bookstagrammers (book related instagram creators). Here are some of the French book reviewers that I’ve found:
Le Tourne Page blog
Fictionista blog
mademoisellelit insta and blog
labulledeslivres insta
pages_versicolores insta and blog
lecturesbyblondie insta
macha_bouquine insta
thebooktrotteuses insta
leslecturesdedobby insta
mars_her_books_and_theuniverse insta and blog
livrement_ka insta and blog
voslivresenunclic insta and blog
Si vous avez des recommandations, je serais reconnaissante aussi!
Hasta la próxima xx
