Kristin Harmel, THE ART OF FRENCH KISSING, chick-lit novelist: Mr. Media Interview, Part 1

Kristin Harmel’s new novel, her fourth, in fact, is titled The Art of French Kissing. It’s a sweet, surprisingly gentle story of a young boy-band publicist, who’s a woman from Orlando, whose life there collapses, and she goes to Paris to escape and maybe find herself again.

It’s chick-lit for sure, but I enjoyed it. It also made me think more fondly of Paris than I had since the one time that my wife and I visited there back in ’88. Maybe we’ll get into that later.

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BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: So tell us that you’re in some fabulous part of the country.

KRISTIN HARMEL: I’m actually back home in Orlando, Florida right now. In the past week, we’ve been in Boston, New York, Atlanta, and now back in Orlando for launch parties.

ANDELMAN: Oh, Orlando. Well, that’s okay. We’ll just pretend you’re in Monte Carlo or something.

HARMEL: Exactly. Can I backtrack and revise that? I’m lying on a beach in Hawaii.

ANDELMAN: C’mon, you’re in the fiction business. It’s all about theater of the mind.

HARMEL: Exactly, my mistake. Sorry.

ANDELMAN: You just released two books pretty simultaneously, The Art of French Kissing, and what I believe is a young adult novel, When You Wish.

HARMEL: Yes, that’s correct. They’re both from different publishers, which I think accounts for the reason that they both came out around the same time. But, yes, When You Wish is my first novel for teenagers, basically for ages 12 and up, and it came out just a couple weeks ago. I’m really excited about that one, too.

ANDELMAN: But tell the truth, Kristin, because everybody wants to know this. You actually outsource the writing of your books to India so you have time for fun stuff.

HARMEL: I wish! I’m gonna have to start thinking about that. Thanks for the idea.

ANDELMAN: I hear they do everything for less.

HARMEL: There you go. Exactly. If I could do that or just find more hours in the day, I think we’d be all set.

ANDELMAN: The Art of French Kissing, which is the book that I just finished reading, from what I’ve read, it seems to hug very close to certain details of your own life. That true?

HARMEL: In some ways. It was basically inspired by the fact that I, myself, five years ago, went over to live in Paris sort of on a whim the same way that the main character of the novel does. And like the main character of my novel, I really didn’t speak much French when I went over, and I went over to live with a friend sort of at a time in my life when my own life was in a little bit of disarray. However, my path sort of parted from the main character of the novel when I went over there in that she actually had all these fabulous adventures of dealing with this crazy international rock star and whatever, and I would say my adventures were much more tame. So I had to use my imagination a little bit to create her world.

ANDELMAN: Oh, I just feel so sad now. I was hoping to hear that you had to tamp down your own experiences to put them in the book.

HARMEL: Well, I will have to say, a few of the things that poor Emma has to do in the book include hanging upside down from between a couple of buildings in Paris. So I’m happy that I didn’t have to do anything wacky like that, but I did have some crazy adventures. Paris is quite a place to go, I think, as a young person or goodness, as any person. I think it’s just such a wonderful city where you could just explore all sorts of different things. I did have quite a lot of adventures there, though.

ANDELMAN: And I’m thinking anyone reading this book is gonna feel the way I did when it was over: “I gotta go to Paris.” But then I think back, and I can’t believe that I wrote down it was 1988. It has actually been 20 years.

HARMEL: Oh, my.

ANDELMAN: I wasn’t terribly impressed. The city is wonderful, but the people there, they kind of spoil it for you.

HARMEL: I had always heard that before I went to Paris for the first time. I actually went to Paris for the first time the year before I lived there, and I had a great experience. But when I went back to live there for the summer, my experience was even better. And I think that maybe 20 or 30 years ago maybe Americans got a frostier reception from Parisians. I really just didn’t have any problems with it. I found people there to be very friendly. I think it’s just a different type of mentality. Probably the best way I can describe it is that I think that, in general, and this is a big generality, but in general, I think that French people tend to warm up to strangers a little more slowly, whereas in the United States, particularly in the South, I think that you meet someone in a store, and within 30 seconds, you feel like they’re your new best friend. Everyone’s very friendly, everyone’s talkative, everyone smiled. In France, in general, I think people tend to be a little bit wary of strangers but not in any sort of negative way. In a way, they’re a little bit more genuine like they want to get to know you as a person a little bit before they make a judgment about whether or not to be ultra-friendly to you. So I found that when I realized that about the culture and that when I realized that a reception that wasn’t warm wasn’t necessarily a cold reception, I think I really sort of understood where they were coming from, and I realized that they were not actually being unfriendly.

ANDELMAN: I’m sorry. I’m going back to my notes here. I just want to be sure. Are we talking about Paris?

HARMEL: Yes, we are. But see, you’re saying you haven’t been there in 20 years, and my experience of having been there more recently is that the people there actually were very kind. And I also think that one of the problems that Americans encounter is going over there and expecting every French person to be able to speak English, and that’s not always the case. But generally, in the big cities like Paris, especially in the retail industry or if you go out to a meal or whatever, generally they speak at least basic English. So I feel like, as an American, if you either make an effort to speak a few words of French or if you just say I’m so sorry, I don’t speak French, they’ll usually warm right up to you. I think that sometimes Americans get a negative reception when they just sort of assume that their language will be spoken. You know what I mean?

ANDELMAN: I’m dying for you to ask me what happened to me in Paris.

HARMEL: Oh, I’m so sorry I missed my cue. What happened to you in Paris?

ANDELMAN: Alright, the only story that I will share because it’s your time and not mine.

HARMEL: No, no, I would like to hear it.

ANDELMAN: I’m dying to tell this. So I’m there with my wife. It’s like middle of the afternoon. We’re starving. We go into a café, a patisserie, I don’t know. It was a place where there were tables for dining, there was a bar. It was the middle of the afternoon. There was no one there, but staff was hanging out at the bar. We walked in, we’re dying of thirst and hunger, and we sit down and we’ll wait, and we wait, and we wait, and no one waits on us. No one comes over, and I finally get up, and I walk over, and I say, “Excuse me.” Maybe I even said, “Excuse moi, pardon.” I tried. I had my University of Florida college French.

HARMEL: Go Gators.

ANDELMAN: So you know it had to be good French. I asked for a menu. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ll bring it to you. So I go and sit down, and we wait and we wait and still there’s only us and the staff.

HARMEL: Oh no.

ANDELMAN: So we wait and we wait, and finally, someone else comes into the restaurant, and it’s a man with a full-sized standard poodle. And he goes over to the bar, and they immediately give him a drink, they give him a croissant, and then the poodle puts its paws up on the bar, and the poodle gets a bowl of water. And this was when I knew that my impression of the French to that point was not far off. They made a real good show of how little they cared for us American people.

HARMEL: Oh goodness.

ANDELMAN: This is in central Paris. We weren’t out in the boondocks. That’s why I keep asking are we sure we’re talking about Paris?

HARMEL: That’s a terrible story. I’m so sorry that that sort of shaped your opinion of Paris. I will say that I have found that, it seems like it wouldn’t be that logical, but I found that, sort of in the more touristy areas of Paris, they do tend to turn their nose up to tourists a little bit more, which is sort of a strange contradiction. But I think there’s another thing about the French that, for me, took a little bit of getting used to because I’m very kind of rush, rush, rush from one thing to the next, and I think sometimes, particularly when it comes to eating or situations in restaurants, they just do things much more slowly. So they were probably having a little coffee break in back or something and thought oh, he can wait.

ANDELMAN: Yes, I think that may have been it. Well, now the reason I asked you this is that… I saw the segment you did on “Good Morning America.” First of all, eight minutes on “Good Morning America” is amazing. But you’re being called on, I think, I guess, more and more to be that American expert on Paris and the French. How do you feel about that part?

HARMEL: I love it. It sounds silly, but the summer that I spent living there, and it was just three months, and it was just sort of a very impulsive thing to do. I just picked up and left my life here behind, took three months off my job, and went and lived over there for three months. But it was a three-month period that I would say really, really shaped my life, and again, it sounds a little corny, but I just feel like Paris has sort of been a part of me ever since, if that makes sense. I felt very passionate about the city, about the country, about learning about French customs and things like that. I’ve enrolled in a French class, and I take French classes now so I’m learning to speak French, although I certainly don’t speak it very well. I’m still working on my accent. But I just feel so passionately about Paris that it’s an enormous honor for me to be called on in any way, in any arena, to talk about what makes France so wonderful. And I think like any country, there are things I don’t like about France, certainly, but I think that, in general, they just have such a different and lovely outlook on life. Being over there and sort of being around that, I think really taught me to appreciate the little things in life a little bit more than I had learned to here in the United States.

ANDELMAN: Okay, but Kristin, now you’re teasing me because you just said there were things you didn’t like.

HARMEL: As soon as I said that, I was like, “He’s gonna ask me about that.”

ANDELMAN: Yeah, you know I want to hear that.

HARMEL: I’m trying to think what I could say that I don’t like. Some of the things are just things that I didn’t like about being over there such as when you’re over somewhere for a few months, you really start to miss the things that you took for granted at home like being able to drive in a car that I’m familiar with or being able to speak to anyone I want in the language that I’m familiar with, so just those little things that would be pieces of traveling anywhere. I will say that I think there are some upsides and some downsides to their approach to life. I have always thought that it must be lovely to live in a country like that where people work to live rather than living to work, if that makes sense. Whereas in the United States, I think that we’re sort of a very work-driven society, like a lot of our lives revolve around our jobs and making money and finding success and things like that, I feel like, in France, people work a short workweek, and again, this is a very broad generalization, but in France, I think the tendency is more to work a very short workweek and then truly enjoy and savor all of your time off. They have standard six weeks of vacation every year and the thirty-five hour workweek is fairly standard, although I believe that’s beginning to change. I think it’s been changed in their legal system, if I’m not mistaken, but for a while, I believe that they were actually limited by law to a 35-hour workweek. I could be mistaken about that, but I believe that’s the way that it is. So in a way, I think that’s wonderful because I think that, as Americans, we could take a little bit of a lesson from that, sort of learn to enjoy our lives outside the office a little bit better. But at the same time, I will say that I think in the United States, we really should also be proud of everything that we’ve built up, and we’re such a successful nation, and we have such successful industry here, not that France doesn’t, but I feel like we’re a little bit further ahead of that curve because of the attitude we have toward work. So there are sort of upsides and downsides, I think, to every nationally-prevailing attitude, if that makes sense.

ANDELMAN: Kristin, I like you so much more now that you’ve given me something else not to be so fond of the French about. We have a call. I think I know who this is.

PETE WILLIAMS: Hey Bob. Pete Williams here.

ANDELMAN: Hey Pete, how are ya?

WILLIAMS: Doing just fine. Hello Kristin.

HARMEL: Hey, Pete, how are you?

WILLIAMS: I am fine. And I want to share this little anecdote first. I’m out covering a sporting-related event here in the Tampa Bay area, talking to a young lady who’s a year out of college, and she’s covering football for a TV station and talking about, “Geez, I don’t know how I’m ever gonna move up.” And I’m thinking it would seem like just the other day, and I know it was 10 years ago, but there you were still in college covering the Devil Rays for a now-defunct publication, and here you are. So congratulations. I know it’s been a lot of work and well deserved for you.

HARMEL: Thank you. Well, Pete, you were actually always one of the people who really was very supportive of me early on, like you were one of the first journalists I met when I first started working, and you were always really good to me, so thank you for that.

WILLIAMS: You bet. And obviously, I am not a chick-lit aficionado, but I recognize the importance and the attraction it has to millions of readers. And I’m just wondering where do you get your material for these books?

HARMEL: A lot of bad dates. No, I’m just kidding. I think that the novels I write are very connected to sort of my own life, and I would say sort of the experiences that myself and my friends are going through right now. I’m 28, almost 29. I’m still sort of going through the struggles that you do sort of in your twenties and thirties of finding yourself and of sort of finding where you fit in the world and among others, the funny, little adventures that I get to go on and like I said, the bad dates. I think I sort of tie together loosely from my own experiences sort of the basis of these characters, and then I sort of put them in worlds or situations that are interesting to me whether they are things that I have experienced or not. For example, with The Art of French Kissing, of course, I set it in Paris, which is the city that I feel very passionately about, but the things that happened to the character there never happened to me. Those were sort of just out of my imagination, but the lessons that she learned I feel are lessons that I’m still learning myself and lessons that I think are fairly universal for women of my generation, I would say.

WILLIAMS: Do you have any plans to take these characters down to the French Riviera and have some, I guess, saucier, racier experiences for them?

HARMEL: I’ll have to think about that. I’m actually in the midst of writing a new novel that’s going to be set in Rome that will come out in summer of 2009. I’ll probably tackle that first, but I do generally try to drop characters from previous novels into my new novels, not in any major role, but I like to have the old characters cross paths with the new characters so that readers who have read a lot of my books sort of can say, “Hey, I remember that person from your first book or whatever.”

WILLIAMS: Well, again, best of luck with everything, Kristin. I’m proud to say I knew you when.

HARMEL: Well, I’m proud to say I knew you, and I’m proud to say I still know you. You’re a good friend, and I appreciate that.

WILLIAMS: Alright. Bob, thanks as always. Appreciate it.

ANDELMAN: Thanks for calling in, Pete. And let me tell everybody that Pete is a host on blogtalkradio.com himself. He does a show called The Fitness Buff. Airs every Friday, at 4 PM.

ANDELMAN: When you jokingly said that you had a lot of bad dates, it worries me there because I thought boy, if that’s all it takes to write a chick-lit novel, then I probably inspired an awful lot of them.

HARMEL: I think that’s just my rationalization in my head when I go on a bad date. I just think to myself that was horrible, but at least maybe it’ll inspire a scene in a book or something. But, no, I’m actually just kidding. I really have not been on that many bad dates. I’ve been fortunate to know and to go out with a lot of nice people.

ANDELMAN: Okay. She’s backtracking again.

HARMEL: I’m backtracking. Sorry guys.

ANDELMAN: It’s funny. When you said that, it reminded me of something my dad said to me when I was starting off as a writer many years ago. He didn’t say it in necessarily a good way, but he said, “The thing about you is if anything bad happens to you, you’ll just write about it and make it a good thing.”

HARMEL: Exactly. There you go.

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