10 Books Set on the French Riviera to Feed Your South of France Obsession

When it’s cold and rainy outside, I dream of being somewhere warm and sunny, and usually my thoughts stray to the French Riviera. Now, I might live in France, but I’m not in the south, and we get our fair share of rain here. Plus, it’s cold in the winter.

However, I’m a 9-hour drive from the Riviera, and although I have a week-long visit planned in May, it’s not close. So, to feed my little obsession, I rely on good novels to lose myself in. 

I’m always on the lookout for new ones to recommend to you, my readers, as well as for our little book club I’m a member of. And these ten are ones I’ve read and enjoyed, and could happily read again.

10 Books Set on the French Riviera You’ll Love

Whether you’re planning a trip and want to get in the mood or you just want to escape there from your armchair, this list of books has something for everyone. Romance, thrillers, historical fiction, light beach reads. All set against one of the most cinematic backdrops in the world.

The Lavender Garden by Lucinda Riley 

I finished this recently and love it. I’m a big Lucinda Riley fan, and this didn’t disappoint. Emilie inherits a chateau and vineyard in the hills above the Côte d’Azur after her grandmother dies. Sorting through the estate, she finds letters and photographs that suggest everything she thought she knew about her family’s history during World War II is wrong.

The novel runs two parallel storylines, Emilie’s present-day discoveries and the wartime story of the young woman who once sheltered British agents in the same chateau. Lucinda Riley was one of those writers whose books are genuinely hard to put down, and this one is no exception. The Provençal landscape, the vineyards, the crumbling walls of the estate, all of it comes to life on the page.

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Akin by Emma Donoghue

Noah is a retired professor from New York, about to turn 80, heading to Nice, the city where he was born. It’s meant to be a solo trip, a quiet return to his roots. Then a social worker calls, and he finds himself unexpectedly responsible for Michael, his 11-year-old great-nephew, a kid he’s never even met.

The unlikely pair land in Nice bickering about everything from French food to screen time, and what starts as a disaster of a trip slowly becomes something else entirely. Woven through the comedy of this mismatched duo is a far more serious thread. 

Noah has discovered mysterious old photographs and begins to suspect his late mother may have been involved in something dark during the German occupation. Michael, with his generation’s instinct for digging up information online, turns out to be exactly the person Noah needs to uncover the truth.

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Not Quite Nice by Celia Imrie

I’ve always loved Celia Imrie as an actress, so I was interested to read this and see what she’s like as an author. Theresa has had enough. Pushed into early retirement and fed up with babysitting her daughter’s difficult children in London, she does something drastic. She sells her house and moves to a small village just outside Nice. The Riviera, sunshine, a fresh start.

It goes about as smoothly as you’d expect. The village sparkles on the surface, but beneath the blue skies and pretty cafes, her new neighbors are sitting on some fairly spectacular secrets. If you want something fun and undemanding that puts you squarely on the sun-drenched Côte d’Azur, this fits the bill perfectly.

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Cooking For Picasso by Camille Aubray

In the spring of 1936, Pablo Picasso is in crisis. His wife has discovered his mistress has given birth to a daughter, divorce proceedings have started, and he has stopped painting entirely. He slips out of Paris using his father’s surname, Ruiz, to avoid recognition, and rents a villa in Juan-les-Pins.

Into this situation walks Ondine, a 17-year-old working in her family’s café, who is asked to deliver meals to the mysterious Monsieur Ruiz. What develops between them is an unexpected friendship that will shape the rest of her life. The novel alternates between Ondine’s story in 1936 and her American granddaughter Céline decades later, as they try to piece together what really happened between Ondine and the most famous artist of the 20th century. 

The descriptions of Juan-les-Pins, Antibes, and the Riviera countryside are gorgeous, and it’s packed with Provençal food, too. A year later, Picasso painted Guernica. This novel imagines what unlocked him.

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Meet me in Monaco by Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb

It’s 1955, and Grace Kelly has arrived in Cannes for the film festival. She ducks into a perfume boutique on the Croisette to escape a persistent British photographer, and in doing so sets in motion a story that will follow both women through one of the most glamorous years in Riviera history.

The perfumer is Sophie Duval, and the photographer is James Henderson, who is about to become far more important to Sophie than she expects. The novel tracks both storylines through to Grace Kelly’s 1956 wedding to Prince Rainier, weaving real historical events with fiction in a way that really works. It’s romantic, it moves fast, and it captures the particular magic of Cannes and Monaco in their golden era beautifully.

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Operation Sunshine by Jenny Colgan

This one is exactly what it sounds like. Pure fun in the sun. Evie has the worst luck with holidays. Every single one has ended in sunburn, arguments, or worse, sometimes all three at once. So when her boss invites her to join them at a conference in Cannes, she can’t believe it. The south of France. Finally, a proper holiday.

It does not go according to plan. Jenny Colgan is one of those writers who can make you laugh out loud on a train and not care who’s watching, and this is one of her best. It is absolutely a beach read. It is absolutely best accompanied by a cold glass of rosé. It will not challenge you intellectually, and that is entirely the point. Sometimes all you want is a bit of escapism.

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Villa America by Liza Klaussmann

In the 1920s, Sara and Gerald Murphy did something remarkable. They built a villa on the Cap d’Antibes at a time when no one summered on the Riviera, and in doing so, essentially invented the idea of a summer season on the French coast. Their parties drew Picasso, Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Cole Porter, and anyone else worth knowing in that world.

This novel centers on the Murphys and introduces a fictional character, Owen, a young American aviator scarred by the First World War, into their orbit. It’s the inspiration behind Tender is the Night, but where Fitzgerald used the Murphys as a lens for his own obsessions, Klaussmann is interested in the Murphys themselves. Glamorous, heartbreaking, and very well researched.

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The Other Side of Silence by Philip Kerr

Bernie Gunther is not having a good time. He’s hiding on the French Riviera under a false name, working as a concierge at a hotel in Villefranche-sur-Mer, a former German detective and reluctant SS officer trying to stay invisible. Then a very famous neighbor needs a favor.

That neighbor is Somerset Maugham, living at his celebrated villa on Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, and he is being blackmailed. What follows pulls Bernie into a world of Cambridge spies, wartime secrets, and the particular kind of danger that comes with knowing too much about too many important people.

Kerr’s Bernie Gunther series is one of the best historical crime series around, and this installment, set against the backdrop of 1950s Riviera high society, is a real page turner.

Buy The Other Side of Silence on Amazon >>>

A Very French Affair by Sue Roberts

Liv has kept a secret for 20 years. Her teenage son, Jake, is starting to ask questions she can’t avoid any longer, and the answers are tied to a holiday romance she had on the French Riviera in her twenties. Which means there’s only one thing for it. She has to go back.

Returning to the Côte d’Azur with its white sandy beaches, her aunt’s reassuring company, and the very real prospect of having to track down her first love is a lot to take on. A Very French Affair is warm, funny, and easy to read in a weekend. It’s the kind of book that makes you want to book a flight and eat a lot of cheese.

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The Riviera House by Natasha Lester 

Remy returns to her late father’s house in Saint-Tropez after his death and finds a cache of wartime photographs hidden inside the walls. They lead her back to the story of Skye, a wartime portrait painter working with the French Resistance in the Var, and a looted painting that has been missing ever since.

Two timelines, one mystery, and the Var coastline as the backdrop. Lester writes wartime France with real authority, and the dual narrative keeps the pace up throughout. If you enjoyed The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah or anything by Kate Quinn, this belongs on the same shelf.

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