NATIONAL BESTSELLER From the Pulitzer Prize-winning and best-selling author: a captivating
brilliantly imaginative story of three extraordinary animals and a young boy whose lives
intersect in Paris in this feel-good escape (The New York Times). Paras short for Perestroika
is a spirited racehorse at a racetrack west of Paris. One afternoon at dusk she finds the door
of her stall open and she's a curious filly wanders all the way to the City of Light. She's
dazzled and often mystified by the sights sounds and smells around her but she isn't afraid.
Soon she meets an elegant dog a German shorthaired pointer named Frida who knows how to get
by without attracting the attention of suspicious Parisians. Paras and Frida coexist for a time
in the city's lush green spaces nourished by Frida's strategic trips to the vegetable market.
They keep company with two irrepressible ducks and an opinionated raven. But then Paras meets a
human boy Etienne and discovers a new otherworldly part of Paris: the ivy-walled house where
the boy and his nearly-one-hundred-year-old great-grandmother live in seclusion. As the cold
weather nears the unlikeliest of friendships bloom. But how long can a runaway horse stay
undiscovered in Paris? How long can a boy keep her hidden and all to himself? Jane Smiley's
beguiling new novel is itself an adventure that celebrates curiosity ingenuity and the desire
of all creatures for true love and freedom.
