In search of lost smells

• Author: FRANÇOISE-MARIE SANTUCCI
• Publisher: Grasset
• French language
• Publication date: 04/2023
• Number of pages: 224
• Dimensions: 14 x 20.5 cm
• Weight: 28g
• Format: Softcover
• ISBN: 9782246831327

Presentation :

One summer evening, well before Covid, a car accident suddenly caused me to lose my sense of smell. As someone who loved smells, I didn't even imagine that they could disappear! And yet, everything I breathed now seemed “empty”: the smell of food, of nature, that of others, my own… Disappeared! Life no longer had any flavor. Even my emotions and memories were affected.
To ward off fate, I kept a diary of my journey in this strange sanitized universe, while trying to understand what was happening to me, and how our noses worked. I also went to meet many “goldsmiths” of smells: perfumers, winemakers, doctors, chemists and great chefs.
I wrote this book to celebrate smell, this little-known sense of which tens of millions of people around the world are deprived – particularly because of Covid. But before the pandemic, who knew what anosmia meant? Denigrated by Kant or Freud, in the process of being rehabilitated by the aficionados of an era in search of pleasures, olfaction nevertheless conceals many surprises. And the questions are endless: did you know that there are nearly a trillion different smells? Are smell and taste the same thing? Why does vanilla smell better than basil? Are there some smells stronger than others? Can we learn to feel again? And what does it feel like to no longer perceive your partner's scent?

Françoise-Marie Santucci talks about her daily life as an anosmic. Always passionate about perfumes, wines and foods, she describes with humor the loss of her olfactory sensations and provides a host of clear and captivating explanations on how our noses work.

The Author:

Former editor-in-chief of Elle , Françoise-Marie Santucci is a journalist and author of several works including Your world is better than the mine (Flammarion, 2019) and Reviens, Lila (Grasset, 2021).

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