Here's the deal. I get an e-mail one morning asking me if I have read the new book Stealing Magnolias Tales From A New Orleans Courtyard, by Debra Shriver HERE
I answer, no, but I would love to.
The reply comes back: Where can we send you a book?
The French Quarter home of Debra ShriverAll the interior images are of her home via House Beautiful
Sometimes bloggers get asked to read and review books, and I just love to do this. So the next day via Fedex this lovely book appears on my doorstep. It's a luscious coffee table size book, with a retail price of $60. It is published by Glitterati and it's about New Orleans. I am in heaven.
As I leaf through the beautiful pages, I am sure I have seen some of these images before, and lo and behold they are different versions of an editorial in House Beautiful entitled "A Fabulously Feminine New Orleans home" HERE
The silhouettes on the shelves are of Debra and her husbandThey had them made by a street artist in Paris
The interior design is by Hal Williamson, and the fabulously feminine owner of the home is described but never named. Now I know who she is! It's Debra Shriver the author of Stealing Magnolias.
As much as I love the editorial in House Beautiful, I love this book a zillion times more!
Debra and I share similarities. We are both New Yorkers who love New Orleans, and who now call it home. She lives in the French Quarter, and I lived in the French Quarter for the first fourteen months of my new life in New Orleans. She is a high powered business woman who has pretty much given up that life for New Orleans, and I was a high octane business woman who left New York and ended up finding my soul and self again in New Orleans. The back cover author photo shows a smiling blond, and ahem, I am a blond who smiles. Where does she end and where do I begin?
Seriously, Stealing Magnolias is a book I wish I had written about New Orleans, and perhaps it is the book I have been dreaming of doing. It is a wonderful gumbo of a book, combining interior design, cooking, New Orleans history, local customs, and all the wonderful things that make a powerful mojo voodoo charm that has made many a person move here and get lost in the layers that make up New Orleans.
image via Debra ShriverDebra makes the Paris connection to New Orleans come alive in the most charming ways. She talks about day to day Parisian life style quirks commonly shared by the inhabitants of Nouvelle Orleans. Her home has trinkets and treasures brought back from Paris, fitting in perfectly in her French Quarter digs .
image via Debra ShriverThere is wonderful amount of information about the back stories and customs here in New Orleans that are just priceless. Debra's writing style is enticing and she draws you in with one heady description after another.
image via Debra ShriverThere is "Proust" style questionnaire like the one found at the back of Vanity Fair magazine that would be fun for you to take.
image via Debra ShriverHere are my answers:
- Occupation: Stylist, decorator, blogger, writer, tango dancer and tango teacher
- The best thing about the city (New Orleans) is: The people, the music, the food, the style
- My favorite meal: Oysters
- My favorite (New Orleans) cocktail: Kumquat Champagne Cocktail
- New Orleans is the only place in the world where: People say hello to you on the street
- My favorite neighborhood: Every neighborhood in New Orleans, grand or humble has its beauty
- The city's most marked characteristics are: The pursuit of pleasure
- My favorite New Orleanian is: Miss Anne
- If I had one free hour (in New Orleans) I would spend it: At Galatoires
- My one New Orleans obsession is: Its beauty
- I knew the spell of the city had been cast upon me when: New Orleans chose me to live here, by making the choice and transition effortless.
image via Debra ShriverBuy this book. For yourself. For a friend. It is just one of those stunning volumes that come along once in awhile. Debra uses the best of the best writers and photographers and artists to enhance her book.
image via Debra ShriverI have about every pretty picture book ever written about New Orleans and Stealing Magnolias stands out and above them all.
image via Debra ShriverI plan to get several copies to give out as gifts, especially to people who still sometimes ask me why on earth I would want to live in New Orleans.
image via Debra ShriverStealing Magnolias is the book I wanted Vicki Archer and Carla Coulson to do, a sort of My French Life In New Orleans HERE
I wanted to co-write it with them.
I thank Debra Shriver for putting her New Orleans book first on her to-do list.
image via Debra ShriverMeet Debra Shriver at a book signing and reading of Stealing Magnolias on November 27, 1 - 3 PM, at Garden District Books, 2727 Prytania Street, New Orleans. Tell her the Vamp sent you.
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