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2000s: A retired professor’s life is thrown into chaos when he takes his great-nephew to the French Riviera
Akin
What you need to know before your trail
A retired New York professor’s life is thrown into chaos when he takes his great-nephew to the French Riviera, in hopes of uncovering his own mother’s wartime secrets.
Noah is only days away from his first trip back to Nice since he was a child when a social worker calls looking for a temporary home for Michael, his eleven-year-old great-nephew. Though he has never met the boy, he gets talked into taking him along to France.
This odd couple, suffering from jet lag and culture shock, argue about everything from steak haché to screen time, and the trip is looking like a disaster. But as Michael’s ease with tech and sharp eye help Noah unearth troubling details about their family’s past, both of them come to grasp the risks that people in all eras have run for their loved ones, and find they are more akin than they knew.
Locations
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Travel Akin to Nice BookTrail style
The city of Nice comes alive via the memories of the old man as he and the young boy walk its streets. Both memories and discoveries new and old are met along the way…
“This four-star boutique hotel’s restful atmosphere belies its location in the beating heart of Nice’s Musician’s Quarter just 3117 feet from the famous Promenade des Anglais and 493 from the Train Station. The quirky decor of its different 42 rooms with travel inspired wall murals recall the Excelsior’s roots as a coaching inn purveying recuperation for nobles and their horses.”
We later learn that this hotel had been requisitioned by the Nazis for its close proximity to the train station. They held more then three thousand Jews here before sending them off to Auschwitz.
Nice beach
On seeing the beach is largely made up of pebbles, and the name of the long Promenade des Anglais:
“Why did the French make the English walk here, was it a punishment?”
Castle Hill
“It’s called the hill on the chateau – the castle – because it used to have a castle on top.”
Well, it’s a significant absence. This was the most impregnable fortress on the Mediterranean, till the King of France blew it ip and said it was never to be rebuilt.”
Lycée Massena
“Students here joined one of the first resistance groups in France”
Place Garibaldi
They got down at Place Garibaldi , where bronze lions crouched in a fountain at the foot of a huge monument to the revolutionary.”
As they wander and explore the streets, they are met with memories and the twinkling lights fasciante the boy. He is told however that when the man was there, you had to tape over the windows so American bombers wouldn’t spot any lights. They see the city through each other’s eyes and it’s a fascinating insight into Nice now and then.
Booktrail Boarding Pass: Akin
Destination : Nice Author/Guide: Emma Donoghue Departure Time: 1940s, 2000s
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