Hi Joanne! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?

I’m the Franco-British child of two teachers; I was a teacher for 15 years before giving up to write full-time. I’m the author of over 25 books in multiple genres, the third of which, CHOCOLAT, became a movie in 2000 with Johnny Depp and Juliette Binoche. I live in Yorkshire with my husband Kevin, and we have a 33-year-old son, Fred.

When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?

I’ve always loved them. I’ve written stories since I was very young, and I’m lucky enough to come from a family of great storytellers from both my French and English sides.

Your upcoming novel Sleepers in the Snow is in a completely different genre from your previous book, Vianne, and you’re known to be one of the few contemporary authors to write across genres. What was it like going from writing a contemporary lit fiction novel to a suspense novel? Do you have any rituals to get you in the right headspace for a certain genre?

I’ve written suspense novels before, so it’s a transition I’m used to; besides, I don’t really see a hard line between genres. Instead, I tend to concentrate on the source of the tension driving the story. In this case, the tension is based on location – a remote cottage on the north Yorkshire moors, with all the isolation and extreme weather that entails – and my protagonist’s attempts to come to terms with his demons. As for getting into the headspace: I use a different scent for every book I write (a technique I learned from Stanislavsky’s AN ACTOR PREPARES.) This time it was an unusual scent by 4160 Tuesdays called THE LION CUPBOARD, which smells of my grandmother’s haunted wardrobe..

What was the inspiration for Sleepers in the Snow?

I wrote the book in the few months that followed my father’s death with dementia. It’s a book about memory, and secrets, and fear, and loss. The catalyst for writing it was finding a box filled with notebooks in my Dad’s things after he died: diaries, showing his mental decline over the course of seven years, and although they were difficult to read, they helped me create the character of Arthur. And I live in Yorkshire, ten minutes’ drive from the desolate moors: the landscape, its folklore and its changes are imprinted in my soul.

Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?

Writing this book was largely a cathartic, even purgative process. But I found the process liberating; and I enjoyed creating the surreal touches – the mysterious appearance of tennis balls; the unusual behaviour of animals and birds – that make up some of the scarier parts of the book. And I enjoyed the research into ancient ballads, Neolithic graves and gruesome local legends, some of which managed to find their way subtly into the story…

If you could describe Sleepers in the Snow in 5 words, what would you use?

Dark. Atmospheric. Cold. Thought-provoking. Frightening.

What do you want readers to take away from Sleepers in the Snow?

As always, whatever they most need.

What’s next for you? Possibly a movie for Vianne to bring us back into the big-screen world of Chocolat?

I’m in negotiation with Disney right now, but I’m not in a position to reveal details, I’m afraid. And I’m just about to launch a children’s book of animal fables, illustrated by Armando Veve, called ONCE, IN THE FOREST.

Will you be picking up Sleepers in the Snow? Tell us in the comments below!

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Lockdown for me was a time of bewildering disconnection. Friends I usually saw every week were suddenly out of reach. Contact with my son was reduced to FaceTime and the occasional walk in the park. To add to the discomfort, I was diagnosed with breast cancer during the second year, and the treatments – strange and frightening – were conducted in isolation, without the support of family or friends. I turned to social media for the sense of connection I craved. I also turned to re-reading favourite books, and thus re-acquainted myself with a novel that had fascinated me in my twenties: Stephen King’s Carrie.

The broad, enduring appeal of Carrie, I think, is twofold. One is the public’s fascination with strange phenomena. The second is the narrative that takes a misfit like Carrie White – abused, bullied, powerless – and gives them power. What happens? In Carrie’s case, her rage, her horror and self-loathing at the changes in her body combine with her teenage hormones in a process that culminates in an act of auto-immolation that also consumes everyone around her.

How could it be otherwise? Let’s face it, our teenage years are a mess. Raging hormones, incomprehensible physical changes, a sense of alienation, both from childhood and from approaching adulthood, plus the pressures of school, exams, peer pressure and the overwhelming need to belong. Plus, for girls especially, there’s the kind of visibility that comes with maturing sexuality; a visibility that can be dangerously empowering for those who conform to societal norms of beauty, and which, for the rest, for the misfits, can appear as a source of increased self-hatred. These feelings of teenage alienation, body hatred and despair are well-documented in literature of all genres, but especially in the world of fantasy, YA and horror, where The Babe With the Power has become such a trope that we barely notice it any more. From Buffy Summers, to Jessica Jones, to The Girl With All the Gifts, the power that comes at puberty serves as a metaphor for growing up, for the sense of freakdom and alienation shared by so many teenagers (yes, even the popular ones), and serves to empower young people, to encourage them to understand and embrace the process of transitioning from child to adult, and to negotiate the stormy waters of late adolescence, hopefully without bloodshed.

But what we hear less of is the fact that for some of us, those feelings never go away. Being a misfit doesn’t end with high school. Nor are the changes that come with puberty the only ones a female body generally has to deal with. Menopause, with its hot flushes, exhaustion, hair loss, loss of libido, night sweats, joint pains, insomnia, migraines and many other symptoms, is equally confusing, as well as coming with its own unwanted superpower: the gift of invisibility that comes with being past middle age.

In books, in films, in music, a woman’s youth is everything. That’s why we try to stay young for as long as we can: we dye our hair, we moisturize, we take hormones. The message is clear: older is bad. Older must be hidden away. The self-hatred fed to us at puberty, impressing upon us that our changing bodies are shameful, kicks in all the more strongly when menopause begins. We are no longer sexually viable: subtext: we are no longer of value to men and the patriarchy. Like all horror’s scariest monsters, The Change (always capitalized, like The Hulk, or The Thing) often remains unnamed, unacknowledged. It isolates us from others. It hides us, even from ourselves. In a society in which youth equates popularity, menopause makes misfits of all of us.

I wrote Broken Light with two thoughts in mind: first, that we never really outgrow the traumas of our childhood: and two, that coming into power doesn’t have to start in high school. My protagonist, Bernie Moon, is a British version of Carrie White: considered a bit of a freak at school (though unlike Carrie, not actively victimized), she has survived adolescence, married her high school sweetheart, become a mother, homemaker, wife and only comes into her paranormal powers (if that’s what they are) at menopause. The onset of her physical symptoms bring on unexpected mental connections – hot flashes of insight – and more, the power to reach inside someone’s mind, share their experiences, and ultimately, affect their behaviour. It’s rather less dramatic power than Carrie’s, although it is potentially just as harmful: and the story, though written with a nod to Stephen King, is much more about the consequences and responsibilities of power than its pyrotechnics. But menopause triggers Bernie’s powers just as puberty triggers Carrie’s: both are a metaphor for rage, though Carrie’s rage is reactive, directed against the bullies at school, her mother and ultimately herself, whilst Bernie’s rage, though quieter, is both feminist and political; the rage of a woman forced to endure forty years of gaslighting from a patriarchy that insists that women’s experience doesn’t count; that we are somehow in a minority.

But the #MeToo movement taught us this: that victims of male violence are not alone. Sharing is power, and that includes sharing fears and vulnerabilities. Naming the monster reduces its power. Shining a spotlight on trauma may sometimes exorcize the shame. One of the discoveries Bernie Moon makes is that her perception of female friendships, shaped by her experiences at school, are largely based on the fear of rejection. As she comes into her power, she learns to reassess this belief; to trust in other women again. The teenage world is often dominated by binary thinking: with greater life experience we (hopefully) start to understand that the binaries we might have once taken for granted (good, evil; male, female; enemy, friend; ugly, beautiful; visible, invisible; abuser, victim) are actually part of a far more complex reality. The shift from stigma to superpower is all about perception. And for those women like Bernie, raised on a distorted world picture in which they are seen only in terms of their value to men, perception – of others, of self, of their power – lies at the heart of everything.

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In The Strawberry Thief, the story continues. But let’s make a quick jump back into the past to the year 2000 when the movie Chocolat, starring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp, was released.

Based on the novel written by Joanne Harris (published in 1999), Chocolat tells the story of single mother Vianne Rocher and her daughter Anouk who want to set roots in the little town of Lansquenet-sous-Tannes, a small French town settled between Toulouse and Bordeaux. Grown up as a nomad, Vianne never stays long at one place, but she always shares what her mother taught her, to make exquisite chocolate which fits the one eating it and gives exactly what they need. Joy, memories, love.

In 2007, Harris went back to see how the chocolaterie has been doing in The Girl With No Shadow and again in Peaches for Father Francis, published back in 2012.

In The Strawberry Thief, we not only see Vianne and Anouk again, but also have the pleasure to know how Roux, her river-gypsy husband, has been doing. The faithful reader knows of, but does not know much about her, is Vianne younger daughter, Rosette, who is now 16 and learns to cope the magic which lies in her family.

What makes Harris’ story about Vianne and her girls special is that there is always magic in the air. It’s never really explained, but there as well is the phenomenal chocolate which I always think I smell when I dive into the story.

To be honest, after watching the movie when I was maybe like 12 and reading the books afterwards, which came out with many years passing by in between them, I have trouble to remember everything that has happened. However, it is still nice to come back to a story 20 years later which I discovered as a kid.

In this book, Narcisse, the town florist, dies. He leaves Rosette some land and asks her to take care of his strawberries. The town priest, Reynaud, who once, despite Vianne, receives a written confession of what Narcisse once did to someone the reader cares about. And then there is this new shop which opens at the former florist’s shop across from Vianne: a tattoo studio. It is no surprise that every book series changes over time. So of course, there are now computers and smartphones in the story which for me, makes it a whole other experience as does the tattoo studio which feels completely out of space in this sleepy once conservative town.

I would have never pictured Anouk to live a different life to the one she grew up with, too. The only thing that stayed the same is that she still dreams big and cannot shake away to be at least a bit of a nomad. Rosette reminds me a lot of how Anouk was in the first book: a shy and quiet little girl for which the world seems to be too big with magic surrounding her which other would be never able to understand.

As mentioned earlier, I do not remember everything that has happened in the previous books and that is the one big thing that bothers me. There was no overview or little re-introduction to the characters, which made it pretty tough to find my way into the story. So for all of you who read the three previous books, please reread it before you pick up this one so then you can fully enjoy it.

And for those of you who never read the other ones? You can read the book without having the background knowledge, because it focuses mostly on Narcisse. You probably will be okay with understanding the other characters.

The Strawberry Thief is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers.

Will you be picking up The Strawberry Thief? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

The compelling new novel from the author of the bestselling Chocolat.

Vianne Rocher has settled down. Lansquenet-sous-Tannes, the place that once rejected her, has finally become her home. With Rosette, her ‘special’ child, she runs her chocolate shop in the square, talks to her friends on the river, is part of the community. Even Reynaud, the priest, has become a friend.

But when old Narcisse, the florist, dies, leaving a parcel of land to Rosette and a written confession to Reynaud, the life of the sleepy village is once more thrown into disarray. The arrival of Narcisse’s relatives, the departure of an old friend and the opening of a mysterious new shop in the place of the florist’s across the square – one that mirrors the chocolaterie, and has a strange appeal of its own – all seem to herald some kind of change: a confrontation, a turbulence – even, perhaps, a murder…

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That’s the thing about books. They let you travel without moving your feet. – Jhumpa Lahiri

To travel is one of the most beautiful things in the world. Do you love to explore new places as I do? I love to lose myself in a foreign city and dive into the culture and history of another country, while others like to go to the beach and explore the beauty of the ocean.

You may pick up a travel guide or search online what you can do in the city you are visiting next. I tend to start writing down a list of everything I want to see and mark it on a map and plan routes so that I will not miss anything. Nevertheless, I also like to get inspired by books I read and I start imagine myself being at the same spot where the characters from the books stood and to embrace the feeling the author wanted to transport a reader to in their story.

Over the years, I have come across a couple of books which have shown me around different cultures and cities through Europe and now, I want to share some of them with you which I highly recommend if you plan to visit Europe.

Let us pick up our backpacks, grab our train tickets, and start explore beautiful Europe!

We will start our journey in Vienna, where I was born and partly raised. Shame on me, but I have not really read a book about Vienna or Austria since I was in school. The most internationally well-known story about Austria is The Sound of Music, which tells the story about the Von Trapp family and what happened to them during the Second World War. Somehow, there’s many Austrians that don’t know this movie even exists! Make sure to see Vienna and Salzburg and visit the places where Empress Sissi and Mozart lived.

The journey takes us next to beautiful Greece where we follow the Greek gods around their temples of which we have heard from Circe by Madeline Miller—because Circe is a Titan, she gives a pretty good overview of Greek mythology. Exploring can make you hungry and after a swim in the crystal clear sea, we eat some Gyros and plan our trip to the next country…

In Italy we follow Lina from Love & Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch through Toscana and visit Crema where the movie adaptation of Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman was made. Italy is perfect for love stories and epic adventures. However, there is also a detective story hidden in Venice. Donna Leon is famous for her Brunetti crime series, and a little fun fact about Leon is that she is an American writer who lives in Venice and her books are published all around the world, but not in Italy because she does not want to be recognised while grocery shopping. So as long as we can bear the hot weather, let’s continue with our trip.

Following Monty from The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee, we end up in Barcelona, Spain. We for sure will have a fun time cursing with him from Italy to Spain and take a go up a tower of Sagrada Familia to see the city from above. How are you feeling? Do you have enough of the heat? Then let’s continue to our next stop.

France, but more precisely, Paris. I have so many books taking place in Paris and I am not sure I can count them all. Who wants to explore old Paris through Eponine eyes from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo? Or follow Anna from Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins to every corner of the city? I for sure would not mind to meet some revenants from Die For Me by Amy Plum or take a trip to the fictional village of Lansquenet-sous-Tannes and eat some chocolate with Vianne from Chocolate by Joanne Harris.

If you have successfully convinced me to continue our trip, we will make a quick stop in Idris from The Shadowhunter Chronicles by Cassandra Clare. Well, we would if we are able to find it. It is rumoured to be found between Germany, France and Switzerland. I guess we will find out if we are descended from Shadowhunter or if we are mundanes…

I could recommend to you a lot of books taking place in Germany, but unfortunately the majority of them haven’t been translated into English so let’s just stick with the classics, The Brother’s Grimm. Their stories will bring us all over the country, but the moment you see a big bad wolf or a woman talking gibberish, we better keep going to our next stop.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green partially takes place in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The book alone is sad enough that we can sit by the Amstel and cry for a bit and then be distracted by all the beautiful flowers that are all over the town.

From Amsterdam it is not that far to take a plane to Ireland. We explore the country like the siblings Addie and Ian from Love & Luck by Jenna Evans Welch. If we are lucky we even can go to the Electric Picnic Music Festival and dance as long our feet will allow it.

Great Britain is the country of magicians, or so I have heard. I am sure we will be able to find a trace of Harry’s magic in those streets as told by J.K. Rowling. Maybe we will be able to make a trip with Kell from A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab to another London. As Travars!

Have you had enough of magic? Then maybe a little bit of crime is what you need now. Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist from The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson are waiting for us in Sweden. Be warned, what they have to tell us is nothing that you will forget soon and it will haunt you maybe. So only take this trip when you really are up for it.

Either way, we will continue our trip to Russia and meet with Pierre from War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. I do not know about you, but this is one of my favourite classic stories and its complexity causes you to be immersed in the story a few times and to watch all the different movie adaptions. Moscow or St. Petersburg, I hope we do not keep lost in time and do not forget to continue our journey, because the next one is a special stop for me.

Next up is my second homeland, Poland. There I will tell you the story of Pan Tadeuz by Adam Mickiewicz, which tells the complicated history between Poland and Lithuania. Of course, we have to make a stop in Cracow, my hometown, and take a look at the Church of Our Lady St. Mary were the story of The Trumpeter of Krakow takes place. To say goodbye to Poland is always hard for me, but we are not yet down with our journey.

Want to see Vlad the Impaler’s castle? Well, off to Romania we go. Hunting Prince Dracula by Kerri Maniscalco will give us a different perspective of it. Okay, I just saw a very big bat flying above us, can we go now? Please?

Maybe the next stop will be not a scary one. And I Darken by Kiersten White takes place in the Ottoman Empire, now known as Turkey, and with Lada on our side nothing bad can happen to us.

Every good thing has to come to an end, even an epic trip through Europe. Our last stop before we will head back home is beautiful Prague, Czech Republic. Karou from Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor is waiting for us and after sight-seeing, we will chill outside with food and drinks and enjoy the cool evening summer breeze while we talk about all the great memories we have gathered.

We hope you enjoyed The Nerd Daily book journey through Europe as much as we did and we hope you will travel with us again!

What other books and characters would we see along the way through Europe? Tell us in the comments below!

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