Why am I passionate about this?

Thirty-five years ago, I bought a dilapidated olive farm overlooking the Bay of Cannes. I was well-known as an actress for such roles as Helen Herriot in All Creatures Great and Small. Moving to Provence, living on the Mediterranean, transformed my life. I became passionate about the landscape, history, art, languages, literature of the region. I spent 17 months travelling solo round the Mediterranean basin, searching out the history and cultures of the olive tree, a mythical plant. I was invited to work with UNESCO to create a Mediterranean Olive Route. I make films, TV programmes, and write books. Almost all my work is set in the south of France.


I wrote

The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Olive Oil in the South of France

By Carol Drinkwater,

Book cover of The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Olive Oil in the South of France

What is my book about?

When Carol Drinkwater purchased a rundown property overlooking the Bay of Cannes in France, she discovered on the grounds sixty-eight,…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of The Man Who Planted Trees

Carol Drinkwater Why did I love this book?

The American novelist Henry Miller who loved France described Giono as "one of if not the greatest writer of the twentieth century." This novel is set in deep Provence and tells the tale of a lone shepherd who dedicates his life to reforesting a desolate valley area at the foothills of the Alps. Over forty years he plants his saplings, right up until his death, by which time the valley has been transformed into a paradise for men, creatures, and plants. The writing is sublime, poetic, and inspirational. This story is as relevant today as it was when written seventy years ago.  A must-read.

By Jean Giono, Michael McCurdy (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Man Who Planted Trees as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Twenty years ago Chelsea Green published the first trade edition of The Man Who Planted Trees, a timeless eco-fable about what one person can do to restore the earth. The hero of the story, Elzeard Bouffier, spent his life planting one hundred acorns a day in a desolate, barren section of Provence in the south of France. The result was a total transformation of the landscape-from one devoid of life, with miserable, contentious inhabitants, to one filled with the scent of flowers, the songs of birds, and fresh, flowing water.

Since our first publication, the book has sold over a…


Book cover of Tender is the Night

Carol Drinkwater Why did I love this book?

I love this book not only for its exquisite writing but because it describes a French Riviera world that has mostly disappeared. The Jazz Age, post WWI, when the Americans descended on this coast and created a fabulous, champagne-fueled playground for themselves. Fitzgerald and his wife Zelda were amongst that high-flying set. However, being the brilliant novelist that he was, Fitzgerald also brings the pain, the confusion and tragedies of love into the mix. The writing is as romantic and elegant as the stunning villas and hotels in which these beautiful people reside, seeking excitement, drinking to excess, living out their decadent lives.

By F. Scott Fitzgerald,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked Tender is the Night as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in a friend's copy of Tender Is the Night, "If you liked The Great Gatsby, for God's sake read this. Gatsby was a tour de force but this is a confession of faith." Set in the South of France in the decade after World War I, Tender Is the Night is the story of a brilliant and magnetic psychiatrist named Dick Diver; the bewitching, wealthy, and dangerously unstable mental patient, Nicole, who becomes his wife; and the beautiful, harrowing ten-year pas de deux they act out along the border between sanity and madness.
In Tender Is…


Book cover of Super-Cannes

Carol Drinkwater Why did I love this book?

This novel couldn’t be more different from my other choices. It is set on a high-tech park called Eden-Olympia nestling (malevolently!) in the hills behind Cannes. The story is fantastic in a way that is born of Ballard’s brilliant mind. It is a twenty-first century, stylised thriller, and way ahead of its time. Ballard takes the edgy, seamier side of life on this French Riviera coast with its racism and elitism several imaginative steps too far and delivers a shocking tale. I read this novel when it was first published and it haunted me for years. After two more readngs, it remains as powerful as my first introduction to it. Definitely a novel I wish I had written.

By J.G. Ballard,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Super-Cannes as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A high-tech business park on the Mediterranean is the setting for a most disturbing crime in this reissue featuring a new introduction by Ali Smith.

A disturbing mystery awaits Paul and Jane Sinclair when they arrive in Eden-Olympia, a high-tech business park in the hills above Cannes. Jane is to work as a doctor for those who live in this ultra-modern workers' paradise. But what caused her predecessor to go on a shooting spree that made headlines around the world? As Paul investigates, he begins to uncover a thriving subculture of crime that is spiralling out of control.

Both novel…


Book cover of Bonjour Tristesse: A Novel

Carol Drinkwater Why did I love this book?

In my opinion this is one of the great novels about adolescence. What makes it so special is that it is deliciously French and amoral. The story of a French teenage girl, Cecile, and her father. They are a team. You might almost call them a couple. Cecile accompanies her father everywhere including to casinos and bars. She accepts his mistresses. Matters take a more macabre turn when her father invites one of his ladies to holiday with them in the south of France and Cecile learns that he intends to marry this particular woman. Françoise Sagan was eighteen when she wrote this, her first novel. Within months of its publication she became an overnight sensation. The writing is sexy and chic. Sagan perfectly describes the French Riviera in the mid-fifties and a woman’s role in society back then. It was an instant classic and deserves its place in the canon of modern French literature. I read it about once every two years.

By Françoise Sagan,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Bonjour Tristesse as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A sensational 1954 French novel that has become a contemporary classic

Set against the translucent beauty of France in summer, Bonjour Tristesse is a bittersweet tale narrated by Cecile, a seventeen-year-old girl on the brink of womanhood, whose meddling in her father's love life leads to tragic consequences.

Endearing, self-absorbed, seventeen-year-old Cécile is the very essence of untroubled amorality. Freed from the stifling constraints of boarding school, she joins her father—a handsome, still-young widower with a wandering eye—for a carefree, two-month summer vacation in a beautiful villa outside of Paris with his latest mistress. Cécile cherishes the free-spirited moments she…


Book cover of The Water of the Hills: Jean de Florette & Manon of the Springs

Carol Drinkwater Why did I love this book?

Like Jean Giono, Marcel Pagnol was a true Provençal, born in the town of Aubagne in 1895. The Water of the Hills comprises two novels written as one continuous saga, Jean de Florette and Manon of the Springs. The characters and storylines are Provençal in every detail. Pagnol’s descriptions of the landscape, the people, and challenges conjure up magnificently this rural corner in the hills above Marseille. The stories are set between the two great wars. Pagnol was as acclaimed as a filmmaker as he was a novelist. His works are elegant, full of humanity and wit. He has an unerring eye for the frailties and unkindnesses in man and how twists of fate and nature play their roles in rectifying the world. 

In 1946 Pagnol became the first filmmaker to be elected to the Académie française. A giant among storytellers.

By Marcel Pagnol,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Water of the Hills as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Tells the story of Jean de Florette, a 35-year-old, city-bred, hunchbacked idealist, his wife, Aimee, and his daughter, Manon. In the second novel, Manon seeks revenge for her father's death, and it is she who brings the wheel full circle in a final dramatic retribution in the town square.


Explore my book 😀

The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Olive Oil in the South of France

By Carol Drinkwater,

Book cover of The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Olive Oil in the South of France

What is my book about?

When Carol Drinkwater purchased a rundown property overlooking the Bay of Cannes in France, she discovered on the grounds sixty-eight, 400-year-old olive trees. Once the jungled land was cut back, the olives harvested and pressed, Carol along with her French husband, Michel, became the producers of top-quality olive oil. 

Her memoirs are richly-described love stories: love for her man and their stunningly beautiful strip of Provence. The Olive Farm recounts her experiences on her farm along with her family and loved ones and a colourful menagerie of pets. Carol's fascination with the olive tree extended to a seventeenth-month, solo Mediterranean journey in search of the tree's mythical secrets. The resulting travel books, The Olive Route and The Olive Tree, inspired a five-part documentary film series entitled The Olive Route.

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The Mazatlan Showdown

By Patrick Weill,

Book cover of The Mazatlan Showdown

Patrick Weill Author Of The Mazatlan Showdown

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

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What is my book about?

Jeff Walker is a champion surfer haunted by the mystery of his father’s murder and his mother’s broken heart. After finding a job as a lifeguard, a rescue mission at sea plunges him into a far-reaching criminal conspiracy.

Walker and his closest friends aid the police in their investigation, through which it is revealed that the leader of the crooks is his father’s killer! The tension builds from that point on until he finally faces his nemesis in a confrontation that will leave only one man standing. 

This first episode of The Park and Walker Action Thriller Series will whisk…

The Mazatlan Showdown

By Patrick Weill,

What is this book about?

Meet Jeff Walker, a champion surfer haunted by the unsolved mystery of his father’s murder and his mother’s broken heart. When he relocates to sunny San Diego and secures a job as a beach lifeguard, a rescue mission at sea plunges him into the dark underworld of international crime.

Along with his closest friends, Walker supports the police in their investigation, and in doing so discovers that the leader of the smugglers is his father’s killer, the man he’s been looking for since he was a teenager! From that moment on, the tension builds, until Walker finally faces his nemesis…


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Interested in France, the French Riviera, and Southern France?

France 924 books
Southern France 15 books