Book Summary and Reviews of Meet Me in Paris by Kristin Harmel

Meet Me in Paris by Kristin Harmel

Meet Me in Paris

A Novel

by Kristin Harmel

  • Publishes:
  • Jul 28, 2026, 368 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

Kristin Harmel, the New York Times bestselling author who "is the best there is at sweeping historical drama" (Kelly Harms, author of The Seven Day Switch), returns with a captivating new novel about several intertwined stories of love, loss, courage, and redemption set over the course of one magical week in Paris.

Nine Americans in Paris. Seven intertwined love stories. One City of Light.

Love Actually meets The Notebook in a tale of love, loss, and finding your way home, all set over the course of one life-changing week in Paris.

Julia Glover has brought her twenty-three-year-old daughter, Piper, to Paris for the first time—but they know it will also be their last trip here together. Julia is dying, and as the mother and daughter desperately try to make memories together as the clock ticks down, the world opens up around them. Piper meets a cute French waiter, who might just understand her better than anyone she's ever met, and Julia meets a man at a dive bar and struggles with how to tell him the truth about her future.

Rock star Jackson Quick's glory days are behind him. He had a handful of hit songs thirty years ago, but he hasn't toured in a decade. This week, he'll launch his reunion tour in Paris, the city where it all began. But he wants more out of life than being defined by fame. When he meets a woman who finally sees him for who he is at his core, the ground shifts beneath his feet.

Henry McGee has been writing hit songs for decades—including Jackson Quick's biggest hit, City of Light. But his secret is that every love song he's ever written is for a woman named Celeste, whom he loved a lifetime ago, when they were both teenagers in Paris during World War II. He has spent eighty years believing she died—but when a letter arrives telling him the opposite, he's on the first flight to France. Can he break through the haze of her dementia, using the songs he's written all these years, to remind her of who they once were to each other—and to tell her he came back for her?

Henry's granddaughter, Melody, has just discovered that her husband of twenty years, Gilles, a French cosmetics executive, is having an affair. When she confronts him, he tearfully apologizes and begs her to forgive him. But can she? And, perhaps even more importantly, does she want to? Or is there a different kind of life out there for her if she chooses to be alone?

These intertwining stories—plus several others—unfold over a few breathtaking spring days, as an unforgettable group of Americans in Paris must find their way to their own versions of happily ever after in the City of Light.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"The emotional core of the story is strong: pursue love, be honest with yourself, and find the confidence to follow your heart...Fans will enjoy this love letter to Paris that is filled with Harmel's signature emotional arcs." —Library Journal

"An absolutely delicious delight! This book delivers a transportive and much-needed trip to Paris that will soothe every reader's soul. I stayed up all night finishing this one. Meet Me in Paris is an exquisitely woven narrative about the enduring power of love in all of its forms. Each of the stories in this book could be its own novel or movie, but they're even more powerful when read together. Readers will turn the last page and want to start all over again. You'll feel comforted, inspired, and completely enchanted as you head to your computer and immediately book a trip to the City of Light." ―Jo Piazza, bestselling author of The Sicilian Inheritance

"Meet Me in Paris  might just be Kristin Harmel's magnum opus. This book is every kind of love story wrapped in the most perfect Parisian package. There's first love and long-lost love, mother-daughter love and the fierce, protective love of best friends. There's once-forbidden love and lost-and-found love and almost-too-late love. There's love that breaks your heart and love that puts it back together again—plus the bravest love of all, the love you give yourself. Only a master storyteller like Harmel could weave all of these threads together into one heartbreakingly beautiful novel. The way the characters' lives intersect feels like Love Actually—only better. I devoured this book in a single sitting; it made me laugh and cry and seriously consider booking a flight to France. Paris may be called the City of Light, but in Kristin Harmel's hands, it should be the City of Love. This is one book you don't want to miss." ―Ali Brady, USA Today bestselling author of Battle of the Bookstores

This information about Meet Me in Paris was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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Author Information

Kristin Harmel Author Biography

Photo: Phil Art Studio, Reims, France

Kristin grew up in Peabody, Mass.; Worthington, Ohio; and St. Petersburg, Fla., and she graduated with a degree in journalism (with a minor in Spanish) from the University of Florida. After spending time living in Paris, she now lives in Orlando, Fla., with her husband and young son.

Kristin Harmel is the international bestselling author of The Room on Rue Amélie and The Sweetness of Forgetting, along with several other novels. Her work has been featured in People, Woman's Day, Men's Health, Runner's World, and Ladies' Home Journal, among many other media outlets.

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