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"  At the beginning of summer, a college friend texted me an invite to join her on her annual trip to Paris. I started that minute to plan my weeklong getaway to the City of Light, where I would have brunch in sidewalk caf\u00E9s along the Seine, take a lift to the top of the Eiffel Tower, and finally be one of the six million who see the Mona Lisa at the Louvre each year. However, before I was done solidifying my must-sees, I received a second text from my friend with her itinerary. The scheduled days fell on the closing week of production for ELLE&amp;#039;s September issue. That made it an instant no-go; I would not be jetting off to France\u2014not this summer.  A couple of days later, I ran across an upcoming novel, Dreaming in French (Scribner), by Megan McAndrew, on the giveaway table in our offices and figured that if I couldn&amp;#039;t experience Paris in the flesh, I might as well bring some Parisian glamour to my life in New York City. And so on my morning commute, I slipped away with Charlotte Sanders, a 15-year-old American girl living in the Sixth Arrondissement in the late 1970s with her cynical and socially popular sister, Lea; her Greenwich-Connecticut-bred father, Frank, an attorney; and her glamorous, charismatic, and eccentric Kentucky-born mother, Astrid. So there would be plenty of window shopping on Avenue Montaigne, after all, and lusting over the season&amp;#039;s must-haves at the Galeries Lafayette (panoramic views of the city included at no extra charge), and strolling through Luxembourg Gardens while snacking on decadent macaroons from Laudur\u00E9e. The privileged Sanders girls seem to live a charmed life\u2014until their parents&amp;#039; marriage is broken up by an involvement with an \u00E9migr\u00E9 Polish dissident, ending the idyllic family life they once believed set them apart. Lea stays in France with their father, and Charlotte makes the move to New York City with their mother. Charlotte&amp;#039;s previously carefree world then diminishes rapidly. She must learn to deal with the emotional repercussions of her parents&amp;#039; divorce and the agony of facing a family illness while living across the pond from her father and sister. For more on McAndrew&amp;#039;s Dreaming in French, check out my Q&amp;amp;amp;A with her below. Or meet her in Brooklyn at Book Court tonight at 7:00 p.m. to celebrate the book&amp;#039;s launch as well as have your own copy of Dreaming in French signed and hear McAndrew read from her novel ( bookcourt.org).  Where did you get the inspiration for Dreaming in French?   It&amp;#039;s a story about cultural identity. I&amp;#039;ve always been interested in the theme of expatriation, which is, incidentally, a very American theme. We are much more willing to uproot ourselves than, say, the French. Just ask Henry James! I&amp;#039;ve been an expatriate for most of my life. I lived in Europe until I was seventeen, went to college in the States, and then went back to Europe\u2014Eastern Europe this time around, back when there was still an Iron Curtain. I was an American girl who thought (and dreamed) in French, and I wanted to write a story about that cultural dislocation, how it always leaves you a little bit outside. So I started off with a scene of two girls and their American mother in an apartment in Paris, and then, because I lived in Poland during the Solidarity years, I thought, well, why not have this Polish dissident coming through Paris?  There are thousands of coming-of-age stories\u2014what do you think sets Dreaming in French apart?    It&amp;#039;s funny, I didn&amp;#039;t initially think of it as a coming-of-age story, because it started off as Astrid&amp;#039;s story, narrated by her daughter. I would say it&amp;#039;s the backdrop that sets the book apart. I don&amp;#039;t think it&amp;#039;s an exaggeration to say that Europe went through a revolution in the eighties. It was an incredibly exciting time. I tried to capture that excitement.   Are you working on another book yet?    My fianc\u00E9 is running for office in Southampton, so we have been campaigning all summer. I do believe my next novel will be about a campaign in a small town.... I already have a the title in my head, and several characters, and a love story, and, of course, lots of bad behavior!  Did you always want to be a writer?   I&amp;#039;ve always known I did, but for a long time I lacked the discipline to do anything serious about it. I was one of those kids who sat around daydreaming, I was always making up stories. Life did get a bit in the way, as well. I ended up a single mother in my early thirties, so terrified I couldn&amp;#039;t support myself that I actually went and got an MBA! Which is how I ended up at Financial Services Volunteer Corps, in Warsaw. My bosses were all in New York, so it wasn&amp;#039;t so bad, but I discovered very quickly that I just wasn&amp;#039;t cut out to be an employee. That was when I realized that it was now or never. I wrote my first novel, which was a terrible mess, in Warsaw. And then I wrote another one, which became my debut, Going Topless.  Any advice for aspiring writers?  Marry a wealthy man! Just kidding, though not entirely. It&amp;#039;s hard work, lonely and not particularly glamorous. You really have to want it desperately! My trick is to treat writing like a job: I write in the morning, then I try to get out of the house, because it can get very isolating. So my rather prosaic advice is, work hard and work every day. If you wait until inspiration strikes, you&amp;#039;ll never get anything done. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/culture/books/reviews/a10493/book-release-dreaming-in-french-360705/>