Patricia Sands

Author

Provence

Let truffle season begin!

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If it’s Friday, it must be France …

In France, for certain enthusiasts, the celebration this week will be all about musky-smelling, subterranean fungi … truffles.

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On November 15, the historic walled town of Richerenches, will open its famous market for black truffles, the largest in France, with the proclamation of le Ban des Truffes. This official opening of the market by members of the Brotherhood of Black Diamond and Gastronomy, begins the truffle season which lasts until at least March. Foodies around the world rejoice!

Photo credit - Richerenches, Bureau de Tourisme
Photo credit – Richerenches, Bureau de Tourisme

Truffle sellers often work out of the back of their cars and vans around the corner from the regular market with sellers and buyers from restaurants and other agents, negotiating prices and making deals. If you know your truffles (often referred to as black diamonds), you are welcome to join in!

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My friend, author and journalist Anne-Marie Simons, has an excellent chapter on the subject in her book Taking Root in Provence.

Great examples of being possibilitarians (my favourite word, as you know). They retired to Aix-en-Provence in 1998 and were wonderful role models of how to begin a fabulous new chapter in life. Sadly, Oscar passed away last year. If you haven’t read Taking Root In Provence, I highly recommend it! 

Click here for the link! It’s also available in paperback.

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A few years ago I was delighted to hear from the owners of Les Pastras, who shared their story with me.

Johann and Lisa Pepin, are a Franco-American couple who left their corporate careers in Chicago to take over the Pepin family vineyard in the south of France in 2003. They wrote me about living their dream and I was instantly intrigued. Here’s a bit of information from their website and I think you will want to know more too.  At this time of year, truffle-hunting forays are the highlights.

“Our 11 hectares produce grapes, olives, apricots, cherries, plums, apples, pears, pomegranates, figs, almonds, hazelnuts and black winter truffles. We offer truffle-hunting tours of the property when in season. Tours include a sampling of fresh truffle hors d’oeuvres, Champagne and a taste of our organic Les Pastras olive and truffle oil.

Fine food enthusiasts can adopt a tree at Les Pastras and receive a yearly shipment of olive oil or truffles. The perfect gift! Visitors can even choose their own tree during their truffle-hunting tour.

And for every tree adopted, Les Pastras buys a fruit tree for the One Family orphanage in Haiti.”

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How cool is that? With the gift-giving holidays just around the corner, how about an olive tree for the person on your list who has everything? My late father-in-law gave us this as a gift a few years ago and it was so much fun to receive our delivery of oil, we kept adopting for several years!

There is an excellent article about Johann and Lisa in The Good Life France along with all their important links. Go on over there and read it, you’ll be glad you did!

How do you feel about truffles? Have you ever tasted them? Are you a fan? Would you adopt an olive tree or give one as a gift?

Amazon Marketing surprised me with a $.99 sale of THE PROMISE OF PROVENCE ebook in a special sale this week only. There are just a few days left to pick up a copy or gift some to friends! Here’s the link. Happy shopping!

Summer sales!

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Bonjour everyone! As summer quickly slips away, I hope you have been enjoying getting out and about again with family and friends, staying safe and reading some good books!

In between enjoying beautiful Georgian Bay weather, I’ve been hunkered down in my editing cave working on my next novel. I can’t wait to begin sharing more news about this story soon!

There’s so much good news to share here, I hope you find something that makes you want to add it to your library. In case you have not seen these graphics floating around social media, I wanted to share them with you before the end of August so you don’t miss these great bargains!

Waving across the pond (s) to the UK and to Australia! Amazon has kindly placed all three of the Love in Provence novels on sale for the month of August in your special part of the world.

.99GBP and $1.49AUD! If you already have your copies, now is a great opportunity to do some holiday/birthday shopping and pick up ebooks for family and friends. The instructions are easily followed on the book pages on Amazon. Simply pop on to your country’s Amazon page for my novels and make your choices! Then lose yourself in the south of France ~ no passport, no packing!

It’s such a pleasure to receive emails and comments from readers (along with reviews, of course). Here’s a recent message that made me smile!

“I discovered your series through Melissa Seeley Face Facebook event. Read first one in record time and ordered the next two as well as Christmas novella. Simone speaks to me. I can relate to her story. She’s settled within herself now but her past still stirs her memory. I’m 73 and she’s my new role model..along with Judi Dench! Old Crones don’t mess around.”

I loved writing the character, Simone Garnier. She first appears in Promises To Keep and was full of wonderful surprises for me too!

In the USA, Drawing Lessons is available for .99 until the end of the month. Just click here. Here’s one of my favourite reviews.

Betty Taylor of Reading is My Passion captures the essence of the story, without spoilers, in her 5* review.

“Author Patricia Sands gives us a beautifully written story of human frailties and human strengths, of facing a major change in your life and learning to move on, of healing.

When I began this book I was expecting it to be a romance novel, but romance is actually only a small part of the story. And when it does enter the story it is beautifully done with a slow progression of two mature characters getting to know each other. But the strength of this book lies in how GREAT characters from various backgrounds with their own mix of life challenges come together to further their love of art and how they compassionately share their collective life experiences and lessons in support each other. For the main protagonist Arianna it is truly a life-changing two weeks as she struggles to come to terms with her new life.

Ms. Sands’ love of the French countryside is revealed in her stunning descriptions. I was so enthralled I just had to view the images myself on the internet – images of the walls of Aigues-Mortes, the wild horses and the enormous salt deposits of the Camargue.

I was able to totally lose myself in this delightful story and highly recommend it.”

In addition, Lavender, Loss & Love ~ Book #3 in the Villa des Violettes series is $1.99 all around the world and waiting for you. Have you begun this series? It was written after so many readers asked to spend more time with Katherine and the beloved characters from the Love in Provence novels. It was such a pleasure for me to revisit them and discover their new adventures on the pages … and introduce some new friends as well. Here’s the link for all of those books.

When Amazon puts our book on sale, the hope is that we will be discovered by new readers. Feel free to share these sales with your friends!

And now for a great giveaway that you (and any reader you know would be interested) can enter until the 25th! Look at this bonanza of books waiting to belong to one lucky winner.

ONE WINNER. 52 BOOKS. OPEN INTERNATIONALLY. ~ Ready, set, GO!

Click on this link to enter.

It’s sunflower season in southern Ontario! Are they blooming in your part of the world too? I simply can’t resist these golden blooms and the memories they bring of discovering beautiful fields in Provence on our tours. Hopefully 2022 will have us back in the south of France making new memories to share with you. Perhaps you will be there with us!

I hope you enjoy this photo. I’ll share a story in another post about that gorgeous confit pot I had shipped over from France … an impulsive moment that brings me a smile every day. Do you ever do something totally on the spur of the moment?

Stay well, dear friends, and happy reading/ bonne lecture!

If it’s Friday, it must be France …

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Bonjour ~ how can July be here already? I just got started on June …

I hope summer has arrived in all the best ways where you are. Our thoughts are with everyone who is being hit with the extreme heat waves and also those impacted by the condo tragedy in south Florida. Here is some information on how we can help.

I hope in some small way the blog posts you receive from authors and other bloggers bring some good moments to you. I’m beginning July by sharing with you my most recent newsletter. I’m up to my eyeballs on edits for a new book and hope to share more news of that with you at a later date.

For now, please enjoy the lavender … breathe in! And enter to win an Amazon gift card! Why not?

Newsletter # 87                                            June 21, 2021

Bonjour,

Happy Summer Solstice! I know how happy we all are to welcome summer and hopefully bid a loud good riddance to the dreadful pandemic. I trust you are all safely vaccinated as the world begins to open up again. It’s hard to believe that June is well on its way to being over.


Under normal circumstances, I would be in France right now with one of our tours. We would be ready to spend some time in the enticing lavender fields of Provence, but that is still not happening. I’m counting on 2022. However, that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy a few minutes imagining ourselves there. If only I could infuse these photos with fragrance!


The header photo of this letter is from one of the most special … and favourite … places to view lavender, the Cistercian Abbaye de Sénanque. Dating from 1134, the abbey remains an active monastery run by a community of monks who gather seven times a day to pray. If you plan to visit, arrive very early to beat the crowds at this time of year. A tour of the abbey is recommended.


Just because so many of us love lavender, here are a few more shots from France. I must admit I was not a big fan until the first time I stepped out of the car beside a field in full bloom. The heady sensation breathing in those scents for the first time is an unforgettable memory.


Although, this lavender field in the last photo is small, it is the one that is most special for me. This is the garden at the back of the monastery/asylum of St. Paul de Mausole, just outside St. Remy de Provence. It’s a place we visit on our women’s tour and I write about it in Drawing Lessons. Vincent van Gogh looked out on this garden as he spent one of his final (and most prolific) years there. A visit to the monastery is always a spiritual experience and I am counting the days until I’m back there in September 2022 to share it with our tour.

While I’m on the topic of lavender, here’s some good news! Book #3 in the Villa des Violettes series, Lavender, Loss & Love, is on sale for $1.99 right now.  Click here to
order your copy.



I hope in another month or so to share some new information about that series. Stay tuned!


In my last newsletter, I offered gift cards rather than free books and that idea was very well received. I still want to share books by author friends and will do so again in the autumn. For the summer, I am going to continue with gift cards … and who doesn’t like shopping for a new book or two?


I’m in the midst of editing my next novel and this one is LABOR INTENSIVE, let me tell you. So I’m cutting back on my summer newsletters to spend that time deep in my editing cave. I promise it will be worth it when the novel comes out. I don’t have a definite date on that yet, but will keep you posted. 


To enter to win a $10 Amazon gift card, simply send an email to patriciasandsauthor@gmail.com and tell me something special you have planned for the summer. We will let random.org software choose the winners. Good luck! Bonne chance!



Congratulations to the previous newsletter winners:
Sue Ahn, Karina Thibodeau, Diane Bryant



Recently I spent a week visiting with the great book community of Bookish Road Trip on Facebook.   On Thursday, 24th, at 7 p.m. I had a LIVE chat there with Melissa Face, author of I Love You More than Coffee. If you did not join us Live, you can always view the video at your convenience.

Before I sign off, here’s a reminder about The Good Life France’s quarterly ezine. The summer edition is out and, as usual, Janine Marsh has done a fine job! Filled with exquisite photography and excellent articles, it’s free, fabulous and all about France! What could be better? Click right here to open and enjoy.


Since I’m doing a bit of lavender overload this month, here are a few recipes you might find enticing! I’ve posted them before and would be truly interested to know if you have tried any of them. I’m always looking for new recipes using lavender, so please do share!


My wish is that you are feeling as hopeful and optimistic about the future as I am. There are still reasons to be cautious and if you are recovering from the lingering effects of Covid 19, my thoughts are with you. 

Once again, to all essential workers who sacrificed so much to keep the world turning for the rest of us, our eternal thanks.
And now, back to edits!



Stay well, my friends, be kind to one another, read a lot and appreciate every single day. Profitez de tous les jours! I’m reminded on a regular basis that the best part of being an author is hearing from readers. I value the messages I receive from you. Thanks also for sharing my books with your friends and for the reviews you write. It’s all most appreciated and inspiring. See you next month!

I’m a podcast convert, are you? Join me on Art in Fiction with Carol Cram!

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It was a pleasure to spend time chatting about DRAWING LESSONS with the creator of Art in Fiction, west-coast Canada author Carol Cram. Make yourself comfortable with your favourite beverage and let us keep you company.

“The Art In Fiction Podcast is a weekly show hosted by author and Art In Fiction founder Carol M. Cram. Join Carol as she delves into what makes great, arts-inspired fiction in a variety of genres, from historical fiction and mysteries to crime novels, thrillers, contemporary fiction, and more. Carol discusses writing topics and interviews a selection of top authors featured on Art In Fiction, a curated online database of novels inspired by the arts, from Music to Dance to Literature to Visual Arts and beyond. Discover awesome novels and get the lowdown on what it takes to be a successful author of novels inspired by the arts.”

Click right here to join us!

Coincidentally, DRAWING LESSONS is on sale in the UK for the month of August ~ just .99 GBP. It’s a great opportunity to pick up copies for your friends too at Amazon.co.uk!

I hope you feel the beauty and intrigue of Arles and the Camargue as you linger on the pages of Drawing Lessons.