12 24 arts

SECTION E

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

CLASSICAL MUSIC E4

POP MUSIC E4

VISUAL ART E6

5 GIFTS WE’RE THANKFUL FOR THIS YEAR

THEATER E3

BOOKS E5

DANCE E3

BOOKS ‘It’s All Relative’ by A.J. Jacobs E7 TRAVEL Quebec City’s chilly charms E9

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THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

ARTS THROUGH

07 JAN.

05

Robert Crais book event 7:30 p.m. Jan. 5. Warwick’s, 7812 Girard Ave., La Jolla. Free; reserved seating available.

(858) 454-0347 or warwicks.com Already deemed a “Grand Master” by the Mystery Writers of America, Robert Crais shows no signs of coasting. The Los Angeles novelist’s newest, “The Wanted,” is his 21st book, and it’s already garnered starred reviews from the trade publications Booklist and Library Journal. The story continues the partnership of wise-cracking PI Elvis Cole and ex-Marine Joe Pike as they help a single mother figure out why her shy, awkward teenage son is suddenly flashing rolls of cash and wearing a Rolex. She thinks it’s drug-dealing. It’s not. The story has two villains, Harvey and Stemms, who would fit right into a Quentin Tarantino script. “We’re really bad people,” one says to the other early on, and then they prove it.

JAN.

JOHN WILKENS • U-T

“Brenda Biondo: Play” Through Jan. 7. San Diego Museum of Art, 1450 El Prado, Balboa Park. $8-$15. (619) 232-7931 or sdmart.org If you’re looking for something to do during the holiday break, check out “Brenda Biondo: Play” at the San Diego Museum of Art. It’s a photographic exhibit featuring 25 pieces by Colorado-based photographer Brenda Biondo, who’s known for her images of “constructed abstractions, conservation and land-based issues.” The exhibit, on display through Jan. 7, bring together photographs from two collections — one features photos of children’s playgrounds, while the other showcases abstract images of the sky.

Biondo, who wrote about environmental issues before making photography her primary profession, has work in collections around the world, including the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., and the Museum of Photographic Arts in Balboa Park.

24 DEC.

Christmas Eve concert 1 to 4 p.m. today. Del Mar Amphitheatre, Inn L’Auberge, 1540 Camino Del Mar. Free. petersprague.com The music will be absolutely fab when the 39th annual Christmas Eve concert is held today at Del Mar’s grassy Inn L’Auberge Amphitheatre. The free show will shelve traditional holiday fare in favor of a nearly all-Beatles repertoire. Noted guitarist Peter Sprague, a driving force since the series’ inception in 1977, will lead the all-star band. It includes drum ace Duncan Moore, ex-Lyle Lovett/ Rickie Lee Jones bassist John Leftwich, and such top area singers as Leonard Patton, Allison Adams Tucker, Rebecca Jade and Nina Francis. Their two-set concert will include jazzy versions of everything from “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “Drive My Car” to “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Come Together.”

GEORGE VARGA • U-T

MICHAEL JAMES ROCHA • U-T

24 DEC.

“Summer: The Donna Summer Musical” 2 p.m. today. La Jolla Playhouse’s Mandell Weiss Theatre, 2910 La Jolla Village Drive, Playhouse/ UC San Diego Theatre District. $130-$140.

(858) 550-1010 or lajollaplayhouse.org Next stop, Broadway: Today, La Jolla Playhouse’s “Summer: The Donna Summer Musical” has the final performance of its world-premiere run. (Some seats were still available as of press time.) The next time the show pops up, it’ll be in New York City, where the piece about the late “Queen of Disco” makes an unusually quick Broadway debut this spring. The La Jolla production, directed by former Playhouse artistic chief Des McAnuff, boasts loads of visual splash and forceful performances by its trio of “Donnas”: LaChanze, Ariana DeBose and Storm Lever. If the current edition of the show is a little short on narrative momentum and a contextual sense of the disco-mania that made Summer a superstar, you can bet on some reworking before this ode to a pop-culture icon hits the biggest stage of all.

JAMES HEBERT • U-T

How to reach us UNION-TRIBUNE ARTS + CULTURE PHONE: (619) 299-3131 FAX: (619) 260-5083 EMAIL: arts@sduniontribune.com ADDRESS: Arts, Union-Tribune, P.O.Box 120191, San Diego, CA 92112-0191

Michael Rocha, Arts & Entertainment editor EMAIL: michael.rocha@sduniontribune.com • (619) 293-1724

Chris Ross, Travel editor EMAIL: chris.ross@sduniontribune.com • (619) 293-1295

Reporters, critics James Hebert

George Varga

EMAIL: jim.hebert @sduniontribune.com TWITTER: @jimhebert

EMAIL: george.varga @sduniontribune.com TWITTER: @georgevarga

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

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SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

5 GIFTS WE’RE THANKFUL FOR THIS YEAR

Theater

BY JAMES HEBERT

Sometimes the biggest gifts in a work of live theater involve the seemingly smallest moments — a single memorable scene, a fleeting but hard-to-shake visual, a particularly startling performance. Here are just a few moments from 2017 that may not have come tied up in ribbons and bows, but proved to be theatergoing treasures just the same: The undead of “Margaritaville”

LEFT: Alison Luff and Paul Alexander Nolan in La Jolla Playhouse’s musical “Escape to Margaritaville.”

What were zombies doing in a Jimmy Buffett musical? I’m still not entirely sure: Something to do with a convention of insurance salespeople who got caught up in a geologic cataclysm years ago. (See, there’s this Buffett tune called “Volcano,” and … never mind.) The point is, the chorus line of suit-clad phantoms in this La Jolla Playhouse world-premiere musical looked incredibly cool, thanks to Tony Award winner Paul Tazewell’s costumes and some dazzling makeup and lighting effects. Their presence symbolized the sense of give-it-a-whirl fun that powered this show, which hits Broadway in March — with (says director and Playhouse artistic chief Christopher Ashley) zombies who’ve been even further enhanced.

recite his famous precepts not from memory, but by reading them out of a book of quotations (“Chicken Soup for the Elizabethan Soul,” maybe?). The moment put a slyly ironic spin on Polonius’ immortal words, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be.”

Finding wisdom in “An Iliad”

So “Bad,” so good

The title of “Bad Jews” might give you a hint: Joshua Harmon’s “blistering comedy of family calamity” (as I labeled it in the U-T review) is one provocative play. Also, very funny. And never more so — at least in director Rob Lutfy’s sharp production for Cygnet Theatre — than in a scene where a pair of new acquaintances, Daphna (Danielle Frimer) and Melody (Katie Sapper), engage in an entirely squirm-worthy conversational dance.

Daphna’s talent for the passive-aggressive is a force of nature. But it’s Melody for the win: Sapper’s oh-sowrong yet somehow magnificent impromptu rendition of the “Porgy & Bess” number “Summertime” brought gasps of laughter at Cygnet.

Just try topping your next argument with that one.

MATTHEW MURPHY

“Every time I sing this song, I hope it’s the last time,” the war-weary Poet laments in Denis O’Hare and Lisa Peterson’s powerfully contemporized take on the Homer epic. Every time I see this arresting near-solo work (just one actor and a musician), I hope to see it again — and New Village Arts did not disappoint, with an entirely worthy production led by Linda Libby as the Poet. Her performance was an arresting one in a year that offered a wealth of memorable turns by female artists — including, among many others, Tonye Patano in the Globe’s “Skeleton Crew,” Yunjin Kim in the Playhouse’s “Wild Goose Dreams,” Minka Wiltz in San Diego Rep’s “Black Pearl Sings!” and Miesha Rice-Wilson in “The Lion,” a Fringe Festival gem.

Rising to the challenge of “Falling”

A heady “Hamlet”

COURTESY PHOTO

There were a lot of bigpicture items to like about Old Globe Theatre artistic director Barry Edelstein’s production of “Hamlet” — the seasoned Shakespearean’s first try at directing the totemic tragedy. And this show was writ in big pictures, offering lots of scenic dazzle on the outdoors Davies stage. But beyond the energized and

From left: Katie Sapper, Tom Zohar, Danielle Frimer and Josh Odsess-Rubin in Cygnet Theatre’s production of “Bad Jews.”

Grantham Coleman played the title role in the Old Globe’s production of “Hamlet.”

JIM COX

agonized performance of Grantham Coleman as the title antihero, the production showcased such smaller delights as Patrick

Kerr in the role of the blithely clueless Polonius. Kerr brought an endearing touch to the character, and it was a smart gambit to have him

Deanna Jent’s “Falling,” a drama about a family constructing their lives around a 15-year-old son’s autism, can be a challenging work to witness — particularly for those with autism in their own families. (I count myself among them.)

But at InnerMission productions, which staged the work’s San Diego premiere, the commitment of the five-member cast to finding authenticity in the piece was unmistakable. Robert Malave’s turn as the affected son, Josh, was the very opposite of a vanity turn — and the way he left it all on the stage was a reminder of why we go to live theater in the first place.

jim.hebert@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @jimhebert

Dance

BY MARCIA MANNA

San Diego’s dance community gave audiences many surprises in 2017, especially in the way it developed its reach, locally and in other cities. By collaborating with music, theater and visual art organizations, and by considering unique ways of impacting the public, dance continues to be a vital artistic endeavor that reaches hearts and minds: demonstrating her swagger in the principal role of “Carmen,” who delighted us.

Paired with her husband, Geoff Gonzalez, as the jealous Don José, the duo made the Spreckels stage sizzle with passionate chemistry and technical precision. City Ballet said goodbye this year to married couple Stéphano Candreva and Erica Alvarado (now principals at Atlanta Ballet) and welcomed promising new company members Iago Breschi, Elizabeth Fittro and Sumire Ito.

Jean Isaacs’ San Diego Dance Theater

San Diego Dance Theater’s Trolley Dances, where dance is presented in unexpected places along the trolley line, demonstrates how movement can alter the way we interpret space. In 2017, the well-executed works by Isaacs and choreographer Dave Massey were staged at the San Diego Central Library, where ghost-like dancers swathed in white draped themselves along the escalator and a team of six performed synchronized moves on raised dividers. New executive director Sara Blodgett replaced Matt Carney, who will continue with the company as a consultant. Now an emerging choreographer, Carney introduced his modern ballet at the White Box Theater. Next year, the company will reach across the border to Mexicali to provide master classes and invite artists to perform at Live Arts Fest 2018.

California Ballet

The stuffy stigma associated with classical ballet is cast aside at California Ballet’s annual Beer and Ballet event, where the first

NANCEE E. LEWIS

Students and commuters watch a performance from San Diego Dance Theater’s annual Trolley Dances. beer is on the house. The audience is invited to interact with dancers, who express themselves with music and choreography of their choosing. Ballerina Reka Gyulai titled her dance “Encounters” and chose a composition by Max Richter to accompany a poignant, breathtaking ballet. Associate artistic director Jared Nelson, whose choreography is known for its blend of dance genres (“Jump Jive” and “The Great Gatsby”), pre-

sented “Ruled by Secrecy,” a sensual work danced to music by the English rock band Muse. Nelson also choreographed “Billy Elliot the Musical,” the co-production between California Ballet and San Diego Musical Theatre that introduced 10-year-old talent Charlie Garton in the role of Billy.

City Ballet of San Diego

City Ballet is known for its elegant George Balanchine productions. But it was ballerina Ariana Gonzalez,

Malashock Dance

Modern choreographer John Malashock’s “Minor Fall/Major Lift” underscores how the relationship between music and dance can enrich themes of separation, transition, dependency and empowerment. The bicoastal project (co-produced

by Art of Élan and staged at the Lyceum Theatre) showcased five choreographed works danced to a live score by the New York-based NOW Ensemble. Malashock also traveled last month to the Midwest, where he choreographed nine segments of dance for the Lyric Opera of Chicago presentation of “The Pearl Fishers,” a production originally created in

ANNA SCIPIONE

Ariana Gonzalez as Carmen and Geoff Gonzalez as Don José in the City Ballet production of “Carmen.”

2004 by San Diego Opera.

PGK Dance Project

As a dancer, teacher, choreographer and musician, Peter Kalivas of The PGK Dance Project is a skilled artist adept at linking audiences with talent in a way that supports the dance community.

The “Falls Back” event at the Lyceum Theatre last month included a presentation of new dances by multi-

ple choreographers, along with a spoken-word artist and a painter who captured impressions of the shows as they happened (both are veterans). He also assembled a notable panel of professionals to witness works by seven local dance companies for the San Diego Dance Showcase, with a focus on quality, craft and execution.

Manna is a freelance writer.

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THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

5 GIFTS WE’RE THANKFUL FOR THIS YEAR

Pop Music

BY GEORGE VARGA

San Diego produced and received myriad musical gifts in 2017. Here are five that struck a major chord: Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers

Whether performing songs

by Jaques Brel, Albert Ayler, Ralph Stanley or Thelonious Monk, she sounds like no one else on Earth.

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers’ triumphant, festival-closing Sept. 17 performance at the third annual KAABOO Del Mar was the highlight of the weekend. Simultaneously rousing, reverent and rhapsodic, Petty and his band soared through hits and deep album cuts with infectious verve and vigor. He looked and sounded like a man very much on top of the world. His sudden death just 15 days later, at the age of 67, was as numbing as his KAABOO show was uplifting.

Andra Day

Charles and Camille McPherson Charles McPherson has been one of the jazz world’s leading saxophonists since the 1960s. At 78, he is half a century older than his daughter Camille, one of the San Diego Ballet’s leading young dancers. The two first teamed here in 2015, when Charles composed and performed “Sweet Synergy Suite,” which featured Camille’s dancing. They reunited with the San Diego Ballet this year for “Reflection and Hope,” which Charles composed in the wake of last year’s presidential election.

Watching father and daughter in action together on the same stage is a double treat that should become an annual tradition.

U-T FILE

Tom Petty headlines the final day of KAABOO Del Mar in September.

Sax player Charles McPherson and his daughter Camille, a dancer.

Andra Day a 2003 graduate of the San Diego School of Creative & Performing Arts who has been nominated for multiple Grammy Awards, joined Stevie Wonder, The Killers, Green Day and other artists to perform at September’s Global Citizen Festival in New York’s Central Park. She delivered a suitably chilling version of “Strange Fruit,” which was famously first recorded in 1939 by Billie Holiday and recorded this year by Day in conjunction with the Equal Justice Initiative. Wearing a broken handcuff on each wrist as she sang, Day linked “Strange Fruit’s” lyrics about the lynching of black men in the American South to current social and racial inequities. In October, she teamed with rapper Common to sing “Stand Up for Something,” the theme song for “Marshall,” the film chronicling the early career of Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. In December, the song earned a Grammy nomination. An Oscar nod could follow.

Vinyl Junkies Record Shack

CHAD BATKA NEW YORK TIMES

Avant-garde composer, vocalist and performance artist Diamanda Galas at her home in New York.

Diamanda Galas

After a recording hiatus of nearly a decade, San Diego-bred vocal wizard of awes Diamanda Galas released two stunning new albums in 2017, “All the Way” and “At Saint Thomas the Apostle Harlem.” They are the 17th and 18th albums of her singular career as a

singer whose solo voice concerts and recordings create an intensely visceral aural world of adventure.

Galas’ hair-raising performances are simultaneously draining and cathartic, as befits a maverick artist who goes for the jugular every time with her remarkable, finely calibrated voice.

Thanksgiving weekend saw the opening of Vinyl Junkies Record Shack, which is located in South Park, across from the Whistle Stop bar. It’s a joint venture between Casbah honcho Tim Mays and Eric Howarth, the former owner of the Mission Hills record store M-Theory and the Hi-Speed Soul record label.

This bright and airy “shack” offers about 10,000 vintage albums (and some cassettes). Its stock ranges from blues, jazz and heavy metal to psychedelic, Kraut-rock and more.

Fittingly, it’s located barely a block from the site of the original M-Theory store.

Under any name, it’s a welcome addition.

george.varga@sduniontribune.com Twitter @georgevarga

U-T FILE

Classical Music

Pianist Cecil Lytle..

BY BETH WOOD

From the lively variety of baroque and chamber-music concerts to the rich mix of offerings from the San Diego Symphony, classical music aficionados here are blessed with an embarrassment of riches. Add to that the vibrant community-engagement programs of Art of Élan and the San Diego Opera, among others, and the future looks as bright as the holiday lights in Balboa Park.

Here are five of the many highlights of 2017: Art of Élan and Fresh Sound

La Jolla Symphony & Chorus

The La Jolla Symphony & Chorus has been a gift that’s kept on giving here since the 1950s. Five years ago, it launched a $1.5 million fundraising drive for its “Sostenuto” Endowment Fund. During its seasonopening Nov. 4 and 5 concerts, the organization proudly announced that the goal had been reached.

Thanks to donors big and small, it can continue presenting its eclectic programs for years to come. Its two November concerts, conducted by music director Steven Schick and featuring pianist Cecil Lytle, were a compelling example of the orchestra’s penchant for performing both classics (Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue”) and newly commissioned works (Concertino for Two Pianos & Orchestra

by Asher Tobin Chodos).

“Cuatro Corridos”

It’s not a shiny or cuddly present, but “Cuatro Corridos,” a provocative chamber opera by UC San Diego professor Susan Narucki and Mexican author Jorge

Singer and UC San Diego professor Susan Narucki.

U-T

Volpi, offers a needed glimpse into the grim reality of sex trafficking. The 2016 recording of the opera earned a Best Classical Contemporary Composition Latin Grammy nomination for “Azucena,” composed by Hebert Vázquez and sung by Narucki. UC San Diego professor Lei Liang also composed a piece for “Corridos.”

Two adventurous local music presenters celebrated landmark anniversaries this year. Bonnie Wright’s Fresh Sound series kicked off its 20th season by inviting percussionists extraordinaire Steven Schick (of UC San Diego and the La Jolla Symphony & Chorus) and UC San Diego alum — and former Schick student — Vanessa Tomlinson. The dynamic duo’s return on Feb. 24 — they performed at the series’ inaugural concert in 1997 — was inventive, playful and profound. On June 17, Art of Élan completed its gem-packed 10th season with a concert by the delightful Myriad Trio featuring Julie Smith Phillips, the San Diego Symphony’s principal harpist; violist Che-Yen Chen of the Formosa Quartet; and flutist Demarre McGill, who cofounded Art of Élan. A highlight of their performance was the exquisite, Art of Élan-commissioned “Variations on a Simple Theme” by Israeli-born Avner Dorman.

SummerFest

SummerFest is like

SERGIO FERNANDEZ

PAUL BODY

Cho-Liang “Jimmy” Lin, music director for SummerFest.

Christmas in August. Deftly led since 2001 by music director Cho-Liang “Jimmy” Lin, the La Jolla Music Society’s monthlong festival is beloved by audiences and the performers who happily gather to make music together. This year, many events were held at UC San Diego’s Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, as the La Jolla Music Society builds its new performing arts center, The Conrad, which is expected to be completed in early 2019. The 31-year-old SummerFest’s educational encounters, coaching workshops and open rehearsals were free to the public, making it a true community affair.

San Diego Symphony

It’s difficult to choose what’s most enriching about the San Diego Symphony — the increasing excellence of the orchestra, its “edutaining” Beyond the Score presentations, the intimate chamber-music concerts, or its community outreach.

But the frequency of visits by the esteemed conductor Edo de Waart has been particularly gratifying. His guest appearance in October was the fourth in the last three years and the first of three this season, including the 2018 May finale. He inspires the orchestra and delights audiences.

Wood is a freelance writer.

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

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SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

5 GIFTS WE’RE THANKFUL FOR THIS YEAR

Books

BY JOHN WILKENS

Five gifts from San Diego’s literary life in 2017: San Diego Festival of Books

LEFT: The inaugural San Diego Festival of Books drew an estimated 10,000 people to Liberty Station.

On the last Saturday in August, an estimated 10,000 people descended on Liberty Station for the inaugural San Diego Festival of Books.

Organized by the UnionTribune and KPBS, the event featured more than 50 local authors speaking about a variety of subjects — mysteries, contemporary fiction, the military, romance, history — in front of rooms packed with enthusiastic readers. Signing areas were swamped. Attendees walked around proudly in T-shirts that read “My Weekend Is Booked” and “The Book Was Better.” A commonly heard refrain: Do it again every year!

Current affairs

San Diego writers dived deeply into the forces shaping our political and cultural lives and emerged with brilliant insight. Brian Alexander’s “Glass House” looked at an Ohio town and its glass factories to explain how shifting economic tides have eroded the social contract, decimated the middle glass and fueled the opioid epidemic. In “iGen,” Jean Twenge documented how social media is making young adults born since the mid-1990s “super-connected” but also “completely unprepared for adulthood.” Nick Riggle explored the pitfalls and pleasures of human interaction in “On Being Awesome: A Unified Theory of How Not to Suck.” Orly Lobel used Barbie and Bratz dolls to look at womanhood and the control of intellectual property in “You Don’t Own Me.”

U-T FILE

What backwater?

An ongoing crime wave

San Diego County continued to build its reputation as a hotbed for authors of crime novels, mysteries and thrillers. Don Winslow hit the top 10 of the New York Times best-seller list with his corrupt-cop saga “The Force.” T. Jefferson

CAKEWATCH Today: Actor Mark Valley (“Boston Legal”) is 53. Actor Diedrich Bader (“The Drew Carey Show”) is 51. Singer Ricky Martin is 46. “Twilight” series author Stephenie Meyer is 44. TV host Ryan Seacrest is 43. Actor Michael Raymond-James (“Once Upon a Time,” “True Blood”) is 40. Singer Louis Tomlinson of One Direction is 26.

Monday: Actress Hanna Schygulla (“Barnum,” “Casanova”) is 74. Singer John Edwards of The Spinners is 73.

Singer Jimmy Buffett is 71. Country singer Barbara Mandrell is 69. Actress Sissy Spacek is 68. Actress CCH Pounder is 65. Singer Annie Lennox is 63. Singer Steve Wariner is 63. Singer Dido is 46.

Tuesday: Actor Donald Moffat (“Clear and Present Danger”) is 87. Actor Caroll Spinney (Big Bird on “Sesame Street”) is 84. “America’s Most Wanted” host John Walsh is 72. Keyboardist Bob Carpenter with The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band is 71. Humorist David Sedaris is 61. Drummer Lars Ulrich of Metallica is 54. Country singer Audrey Wiggins is 50. Guitarist J (White Zombie) is 50.

Actor-singer Jared Leto of 30 Seconds To Mars is 46. Singer Chris Daughtry (“American Idol”) is 38. Actress Beth Behrs (“2 Broke Girls”) is 32. Actor Kit Harington (“Game of Thrones”) is 31.

Wednesday: Actor John Amos (“Men In Trees,” “The West Wing”) is 78. News correspondent Cokie Roberts is 74.

Guitarist Mick Jones of Foreigner is 73.

Singer Tracy Nelson is 73. Actor Gerard Depardieu is 69. Actor Ian Gomez (“Felicity,” “The Drew Carey Show”) is 53. Actress Eva LaRue (“CSI: Miami”) is 51. Actor Wilson Cruz (“Party of Five,” “My So-Called Life”) is 44. Actor Masi Oka (“Hawaii Five-0,” “Heroes”) is 43.

Thursday: Comic book creator Stan

Lee (“Spider-Man,” “The Incredible Hulk”) is 95. Actress Nichelle Nichols (“Star Trek”) is 85. Actress Maggie Smith is 83. Saxophonist Charles Neville of the Neville Brothers is 79.

Singer-keyboardist Edgar Winter is 71.

Actor Denzel Washington is 63.

Country singer Joe Diffie is 59. Drummer Mike McGuire of Shenandoah is 59. Actor Chad McQueen (the “Karate Kid” films) is 57. Country singerguitarist Marty Roe of Diamond Rio is 57. Actor Malcolm Gets (“Caroline in the City”) is 54. Comedian Seth Meyers (“Late Night With Seth Meyers”) is 44. Actor Joe Manganiello (“True Blood”) is 41. Singer John Legend is 39. Actress Sienna Miller is 36. Actor Beau Garrett (“The Good Doctor”) is 35. Actress Mackenzie

pillars of patriarchy crumbled, local writers shined a light on worthy alternatives, pioneering women whose achievements have too often been overlooked. In “Ellen Browning Scripps,” Molly McClain unpacked the rich life and legacy of a San Diegan whose philanthropy helped shaped schools, hospitals, museums, parks and the zoo.

Elizabeth Cobbs told the story of “The Hello Girls,” telephone operators who were close enough to the front lines to carry gas masks and helmets during World War I but were denied veterans’ benefits when they came home. “Chicana Tributes,” co-edited by Rita Sanchez, detailed the civil rights contributions of 61 local leaders and activists in such fields as education, government, journalism and the arts.

U-T FILE

Parker launched a new series, set largely in North County, that features a Marine-turned-cop-turnedprivate-investigator in “The

Room of White Fire.”

Among the other locally written highlights: Matthew Quirk’s “Dead Man Switch,” Lisa Brack-

Rosman (“7th Heaven”) is 28.

Fred Ward (“The Right Stuff”) is 75.

Singer Mike Nesmith of The Monkees is 75. Actress Concetta Tomei (“Providence,” “China Beach”) is 72.

Singer Patti Smith is 71. Musician Jeff Lynne is 70. TV host Meredith Vieira is 64. Actress Sheryl Lee Ralph (“Moesha”) is 62. Former “Today” show anchor Matt Lauer is 60. Actress-comedian Tracey Ullman is 58. TV host Sean Hannity is 56.

Actor George Newbern (“Providence”) is 54. Singer-actor Tyrese is 39. Actress Eliza Dushku (“Dollhouse,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”) is 37. Singer Andra Day is 33. Singer Ellie Goulding is 31.

Friday: Actor Jon Voight is 79.

Country singer Ed Bruce is 78. Flutist Ray Thomas (Moody Blues) is 76.

Singer Marianne Faithfull is 71. Actor Ted Danson is 70. Comedian Paula Poundstone is 58. Guitarist-singer Jim Reid of The Jesus And Mary Chain is 56. Actor Michael Cudlitz (“The Walking Dead”) is 53. Actor Jason Gould is 51. Actor Jude Law is 45. Actress Maria Dizzia (“Orange Is The New Black”) is 43.

Saturday: Actor Russ Tamblyn is

83. Singer Noel Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul and Mary is 80. Director James Burrows (“Cheers,” “Taxi”) is 77. Actor

ASSOCIATED PRESS

COURTESY PHOTO

mann’s “Go-Between” and Matt Coyle’s “Blood Truth.”

ABOVE LEFT: Crime novelist Don Winslow.

Herstory

ABOVE: Author Molly McClain.

In a year when corrupt

San Diego sometimes has a reputation as a place major artists bypass.

They’d rather do several nights in L.A. than head south, or so the thinking goes. But 2017 saw quite a few big-time writers alight here, including Pulitzer Prize winners Elizabeth Strout, Tracy Kidder and Garry Wills, and National Book Award winner Sherman Alexie. Salman Rushdie headlined the annual Words Alive author luncheon. Sci-fi and fantasy star Brandon Sanderson had 500 people crowding the aisles at Mysterious Galaxy in Clairemont. Neil Gaiman, Alice Hoffman, Patrick Rothfuss, Mark Bowden, Isabel Allende, David Sedaris and on and on it went.

john.wilkens@sduniontribune.com

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THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

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5 GIFTS WE’RE THANKFUL FOR THIS YEAR

Visual Art

BY MICHAEL JAMES ROCHA

It was a roller-coaster ride for the visual art community in 2017. There were highs: several local institutions participated in the regional initiative “Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA.” And there were lows: the San Diego Art Institute’s progressive executive director, Ginger Shulick Porcella, in April left the Balboa Park institution for the Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson. And there were controversies: the San Diego Chinese Historical Museum underwent a major shakeup, and local arts leaders worried about threats to dismantle the National Endowment for the Arts. It was a memorable year in the world of visual art. Here are five highlights: San Diego Museum of Art: “Modern Masters From Latin America: The Pérez Simón Collection”

the works for their respective exhibits. The Timken’s “Monet’s Étretat: Destination and Motif ” features Étretat, an old fishing village framed by white cliffs on the coast of Normandy.

Next door, the San Diego Museum of Art’s “Reflections on Monet” showcases a large-scale painting of the lily pond in Monet’s backyard in Giverny, “Waterlilies.”

One of numerous local exhibitions that were part of the larger “Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA” initiative, this San Diego Museum of Art exhibit showcased a private collection of telecommunications magnate Juan Antonio Pérez Simón that had never before been displayed publicly. On view through March 11, it features nearly 100 pieces by modern masters from many Latin American countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela. It’s a who’s who of modern artists — from Frida Kahlo and Rufino Tamayo to Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco, just to name a few.

“unDocumenta”

“Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA”

Speaking of “Pacific Standard Time,” the regional artistic collaboration features more than 70

COURTESY PHOTO

Ricardo Martínez de Hoyos’ “Recumbent Figure (Figura yacente),” 1984, at “Modern Masters.”

Southern California cultural institutions, including The Getty, which is spearheading the project. Museums and organizations from Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Palm Springs, Riverside, Orange County and San Diego came on board for the pioneering effort, whose last iteration was in 2011-2012 in a show called “Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 19451980.” Local participants include major art institutions like the Oceanside Museum of Art, Mingei International Museum, Museum of Photographic Arts, University of San Diego’s Robert and Karen Hoehn Family Galleries, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego and San Diego Museum of Art.

Monet

Claude Monet definitely had a good showing in San

On display through Jan. 28, “unDocumenta” at the Oceanside Museum of Art showcases the work of six San Diego and Tijuana artists. The exhibit, part of “Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA,” puts the spotlight on the physical and cultural border shared by two nations and explores the effects of that intersection culturally, economically and politically. One of the pieces — “Of Fence” — is an installation by artist Marcos Ramirez, known as “ERRE,” who put up a wall on the museum’s facade as his artistic statement on the physical wall that’s proposed 60 miles south on the U.S.-Mexico border.

San Ysidro

COURTESY PHOTO

Monet’s “Le Bassin des Nymphéas,” 1904, is at the San Diego Museum of Art through Jan. 21.

Diego this year. Five significant paintings by the legendary French impressionist are on exhibit at the San Diego Museum of Art (through Jan. 21) and the

neighboring Timken Museum of Art (through Dec. 31) in Balboa Park. It wasn’t planned: Both museums worked independently for more than a year to secure

Earlier this month, Voice of San Diego’s Kinsee Morlan wrote: “San Ysidro, the neighborhood that touches the U.S.-Mexico border, is home to just two pieces of public art. But that will soon change.” Thanks to an initiative by the city’s Commission for Arts and Culture, she wrote, a newly launched effort “will work to put public art in four neighborhoods that need it. The first to benefit from the program will be San Ysidro.

Up to three artists or artist teams will each receive approximately $40,000 to create new art for a cityowned or city-approved site in the neighborhood.”

michael.rocha@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @outdoorlivingsd

ALLEN J. SCHABEN LOS ANGELES TIMES

Marcos Ramirez “ERRE” installs “Of Fence” on the facade of the Oceanside Museum of Art.

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

BOOKS

E7

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

New in stores “Past Perfect: A Novel” by Danielle Steel (Delacorte Press).

“The Mother of Black Hollywood: A Memoir” by Jenifer Lews

Steel’s latest work is a story of two families living a hundred years apart and coming together in time, opening the door to rare friendship and major events in early 20th-century history.

(Amistad). Co-star of the hit sitcom “Black-ish,” Lewis bares the soul of a Midwestern girl with a dream, whose journey took her from poverty to the big screen.

New York Times best-sellers BOOK REVIEW

Fiction 1. “Origin” by Dan Brown (Doubleday)

2. “The Rooster Bar” by John Grisham (Doubleday)

3. “Year One” by Nora Roberts (St. Martin’s)

4. “The People vs. Alex Cross” by James Patterson (Little, Brown)

5. “The Midnight Line” by Lee Child (Delacorte)

6. “Artemis” by Andy Weir (Crown)

7. “End Game” by David Baldacci (Grand Central)

8. “Tom Clancy Power and Empire” by Marc Cameron (Putnam)

9. “Hardcore Twenty-Four” by Janet Evanovich (Putnam)

10. “Little Fires Everywhere” by Celeste Ng (Penguin Press) Nonfiction 1. “Leonardo da Vinci” by Walter Isaacson (Simon & Schuster)

2. “Grant” by Ron Chernow (Penguin Press)

3. “Andrew Jackson and the Miracle of New Orleans” by Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger (Sentinel)

4. “Obama: An Intimate Portrait” by Pete Souza (Little, Brown)

5. “Let Trump Be Trump” by Corey R. Lewandowski and David N. Bossie (Center Street)

6. “Killing England” by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard (Holt)

7. “Astrophysics for People in a Hurry” by Neil deGrasse Tyson (Norton)

8. “Bobby Kennedy” by Chris Matthews (Simon & Schuster)

9. “Promise Me, Dad” by Joe Biden (Flatiron Books)

10. “Sisters First” by Jenna Bush Hager and Barbara Pierce Bush (Grand Central) Warwick’s top sellers 1. “Discipline Equals Freedom” by Jocko Willink (event)

2. “In Such Good Company” by Carol Burnett (off-site event)

3. “Leonardo da Vinci” by Walter Isaacson

4. “In the Midst of Winter” by Isabel Allende

5. “Origin” by Dan Brown

6. “Obama: An Intimate Portrait” by Pete Souza

7. “The Rooster Bar” by John Grisham

8. “Here We Are” by Oliver Jeffers

9. “Sing, Unburied, Sing” by Jesmyn Ward

10. “Killers of the Flower Moon” by David Grann

‘IN THE WINDOW’ A GRIPPING FIRST NOVEL

BY PATRICK ANDERSON Most of the hundreds of first novels published each year sink like stones into a vast, cold ocean of indifference. A lucky handful receive a more favorable welcome. A.J. Finn’s “The Woman in the Window” is among these fortunate few.

Even before its publication, movie rights were sold as well as foreign rights in multiple countries. Novels such as this, for which publishers have high hopes, are often dreadful potboilers. But if “The Woman in the Window” achieves success, it will be entirely deserved. It’s a beautifully written, brilliantly plotted, richly enjoyable tale of love, loss and madness.

The title character, Anna Fox, is 38 and lives alone in a costly house in uptown Manhattan. We soon learn why she is so often peering out her window. She is agoraphobic and has not left home in nearly a year, but she delights in spying on her neighbors.

Otherwise, Anna drinks a great deal of wine, mostly merlot, and watches countless black-and-white movie classics — “Gaslight,” “Rebecca,” “Strangers on a Train” and “Spellbound” are among her favorites.

Anna’s husband has left her and taken their 8-year-old daughter with him. She talks to them by phone and vainly begs him to return. She’s a child psychologist and still advises a few patients by email, but mostly she is alone with her wine, movies and cat.

She also has a tenant, a handsome carpenter who lives in her basement. His presence injects a bit of “will they or won’t they?” excitement, but mostly she is content to spy on her neighbors.

Then, Ethan Russell, a boy of 16 who lives across the street, arrives bearing a gift from his mother. He is a good-looking, friendly lad: “He looks like a boy Ionce knew, once kissed — summer camp in Maine, a quarter century ago. I like him.”

Anna meets Ethan’s parents, Paul and Jane, and Finn’s plot kicks in.

The Russells are a “The Woman in troubled the Window” by family.

A. J. Finn; MorEthan hints that row; 448 pages his father is violent toward his wife and son. Anna uses her binoculars to learn more, and one day sees what she believes is an act of violence. She calls the police, who investigate and find no problem. They think Anna’s wine consumption — two or three bottles a day — along with the many prescription drugs she consumes, have impaired her judgment. (Anna cherishes George Bernard Shaw’s quip that alcohol is the “anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life.”) She continues to spy on the Russells, and dark deeds soon unfold.

As the plot seizes us, the prose caresses us. Anna recalls “Central Park, swans with their question-mark necks, high noon beyond the lacy elms.” A woman “walks west, toward the avenue, the crown of her head a halo in the sunset.” Thinking of a man she fears, “I shudder, wade deeper into my wineglass.” She mourns that “yesterday had faded like a flower.”

Although Finn’s plot must not be revealed, it’s fair to say that his characters are rarely who or what they first appear to be. And that his story ends with a series of mind-boggling surprises. “The Woman in the Window” is first-rate entertainment that is finally a moving portrait of a woman fighting to preserve her sanity.

Anderson writes regularly about thrillers and mysteries for The Washington Post.

ENTHRALL IN THE FAMILY

“It’s All Relative: Adventures Up and Down the World’s Family Tree” by A.J. Jacobs; Simon & Schuster; 336 pages

A.J. Jacobs’ ‘It’s All Relative’ finds the ties that bind — everyone

BY ERIC WEINER Few things in life yield such a bountiful harvest of joy and heartache as family.

Family is fraught and has been ever since the first cave dwellers bickered over who got the “good rock,” next to the fire. Over the years, many authors have weighed in on the mixed bag that is family, but few have done so with the keen eye, sharp tongue and big heart of A.J. Jacobs.

His timing is good.

Thanks to advances in DNA testing, we’re living in a golden age of genealogy. That is, he acknowledges, a bit like saying that “we’re in the sexiest era of professional bowling.” In Jacobs’ hands, though, this potentially parched subject comes alive.

He makes terms like “mitochondrial DNA” not only comprehensible but fun.

Jacobs concedes from the outset of “It’s All Relative” that he has an agenda: world peace. The way to accomplish this, he believes, is through a kind of genetic sleight of hand. Studies find that we treat people better if we know they’re family, so why not hijack this tendency to favor kin over strangers by tricking our brains into believing that everyone is kin?

Only it’s not a trick. As Jacobs demonstrates convincingly, we are all family. (“Whether we like it or not,” quips Henry Louis Gates, in a cameo.) Go back far enough, and we all share a common ancestry.

Jacobs’ ancestral journey begins the way all great genetic spelunking begins these days: by spitting into a tube. His DNA results are, at first blush, remarkably boring. Jacobs is a plain-vanilla Ashkenazi Jew, with a smattering of “other.” Thankfully, he isn’t deterred. He digs and digs. He tracks down relatives, distant and really distant. He scours old newspaper clippings. He mines a massive database of tombstones called Find a Grave. (“Genealogists love a good graveyard.”) Soon, he unearths a family history “drenched with booze” and replete with tales of courage and cowardice, virtue and pettiness. Love, too.

At the same time, he explores the nooks and crannies of “the geeky world of family history.” He attends a twins convention; tracks down a real McCoy, of the famous Hatfield-McCoy feud; and discovers that he, like nearly all of us, is part Neanderthal. He makes predictable but rewarding pilgrimages to Ellis Island and Salt Lake City, home of the Mormons, those “genealogy rock stars,” who believe that families are reunited in the afterlife — so studying ancestry is important for strengthening relationships both now and for eternity.

Jacobs also considers the controversial question of close-cousin marriage (conclusion: “love trumps ickiness”).

Along the way, he manages to prove Tolstoy wrong.

All happy families are not alike. They come in more flavors than ever. Today, we don’t so much inherit family

LEM LATTIMER

A.J. Jacobs, journalist and author of “It’s All Relative.” as create it. “You no longer need to share chromosomes to call yourself kin,” concludes Jacobs. (As an adoptive father myself, I consider this a full-on blessing.)

Nestled within “It’s All Relative” is a project, and an ambitious one at that.

Jacobs wants to hold the world’s largest family reunion. The Global Family Reunion, he calls it. The plan is to gather a few thousand of his relatives and celebrate not only their kinship but the very notion of kinship. Is it a gimmick? Sure. But it’s a good gimmick, a noble one, and that makes all the difference.

Jacobs is the Zelig of genealogy. There he is doing the warm-up act for Donny Osmond. Now he’s hanging with his very famous, very distant cousins, from Daniel Radcliffe to George H.W. Bush to Ricky Gervais.

Jacobs defends this sort of celebrity genealogy — epitomized by such TV shows as “Who Do You Think You Are?” — on the grounds that “they inspire people to trace their own pasts.” Perhaps. Or maybe it’s just a sophisticated way of justifying our voyeurism.

Jacobs, thankfully, tempers his Kumbaya tendencies with some hard-nosed questions. Does knowing your ancestry expand your circle of compassion or shrink it? The jury is out. An anti-Semite discovers he is

part Jewish and reforms his ways. White supremacists hold online contests to see who has the highest percentage of European descendants. Genealogy, too, is fraught.

Jacobs doesn’t shy away from this fact, exploring the dark side of genealogy: not only relatives with checkered pasts (one of his in-laws served time in Sing Sing prison for murder) but privacy concerns and the very real danger that all of this DNA testing may render us more tribal, not less.

“It’s All Relative” is a whirlwind of a book, as Jacobs zip-lines from one branch of the global family tree to another. At times, it feels like a blur of greatgreat-grandfathers and seventh cousins once removed. So determined is Jacobs to leave no branch unexamined that he sometimes loses sight of the forest.

I would have liked less time on the twigs and deeper dives into the roots.

Jacobs treats the reader like family. He shares a lot and without asking permission. In particular, he shares his every neurotic twitch surrounding the Global Family Reunion, from the catering requirements (potato salad for 3,000) to the sponsors (fickle) to the deliciously ironic dispute among Sister Sledge (slated to perform their ode to kinship, “We Are Family”).

Despite his ineptness, or perhaps because of it, I found myself rooting for him and his quixotic project. Did I believe that Jacobs’ gathering of a few thousand cousins on a soggy Queens field would change the world? Not for a second, but it was fun and uplifting to watch him try.

Perhaps the only thing more fraught than family is humor. Jacobs, courageously, attempts to combine the two.

He pulls it off, mostly. I laughed when he described ancestry sites as “Facebook for dead people” or his father, a legal scholar, as “the Wayne Gretzky of footnotes.” I grimaced when he gratuitously deployed the term “cousin humper.”

Besides, Jacobs is at his most endearing when he drops the comedy armor and gets real. With the Global Family Reunion approaching rapidly, he writes: “I’ve never been in charge of a cause that people actually believe in. It’s terrifying.

About half the time I feel like a fraud.”

By the end of “It’s All Relative,” Jacobs feels like, well, family. Mostly endearing, occasionally annoying but always well-intentioned and, in the final analysis, indispensable. Now if only he’d call more often.

Weiner is the author of “The Geography of Genius: Lessons From the World’s Most Creative Places.”

R ECO M M E N D E D R E A DS Welcome to our literary circle, in which San Diegans pass the (printed) word on books they recommend:

Sarah Chen

Stephanie Kern

Job: Bookseller, Mysterious Galaxy

Job: Library clerk, San Carlos Branch Library, San Diego Public Library

She recommends: “Blood Truth”

by Matt Coyle (Oceanview Publishing, 2017; 368 pages) Why? This is the fourth in the Rick Cahill P.I. series and for me, the most emotionally charged. Rick investigates two cases, both involving loved ones, so already you know there’s a lot at stake. One case involves Kim, his ex-girlfriend, who hires Rick to confirm her suspicions that her husband is having an affair. The other dredges up Rick’s long-suppressed shame of his deceased father, a disgraced cop, when a safe is discovered in his childhood home. The two storylines weave together flawlessly. Kim’s case takes Rick into shady real estate deals and eventually, murder.

His personal crusade to uncover the truth about his father leads to a 20-year-old cold case. Rick struggles between his need to see justice served and the fear of what he’ll discover about his own flesh and blood. Coyle skillfully breaks up the thrilling action with more introspective moments, resulting in a top-notch read.

She recommends: “Lincoln in the Bardo”

by George Saunders (Random House, 2017; 341 pages) Why? Winner of the 2017 Man Booker Prize for Fiction, George Saunders’s “Lincoln in the Bardo” is a stylistically daring novel that follows the ghosts who inhabit the cemetery where Abraham Lincoln’s son, Willie, lies recently interred. Taking place over the span of one night in 1862, the narrative alternates excerpts from historical accounts with the first-person stories of the deceased. A newlywed printer, a verbose student, and a contrite reverend anchor the novel, serving as the reader’s guides through the bardo, a Tibetan term for the liminal space between life and death. The innovative “Lincoln in the Bardo” is a moving and thought-provoking read and an excellent choice for a cool and cloudy night.

E8

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

TELEVISION (50th anniversary).

BEST B E TS

“Disney Parks Magical Christmas Celebration”: ABC, 10 a.m. Disney Parks celebrates the joy of the holiday season, as hosts Julianne Hough and Nick Lachey take viewers on a magical ride down Main Street, U.S.A. and beyond. The Christmas Day celebration brings together the beloved Christmas Day parade, surprise celebrity guests and heartwarming family stories to celebrate the most wonderful time of the year. Musical guests include Ciara, Darius Rucker, Fifth Harmony, Fitz and the Tantrums, Jason Derulo and Lea Michele.

Sunday “That ’70s Show” Marathon: IFC, beginning at 6 a.m. Catch a marathon of holiday-themed episodes from the popular comedy series.

“White Christmas:” AMC, 2:45 p.m. In this Oscar-nominated holiday favorite, successful song-and-dance team Bob Wallace (Bing Crosby) and Phil Davis (Danny Kaye) join sister act Betty (Rosemary Clooney) and Judy Haynes (Vera-Ellen) to perform a Christmas show in rural Vermont. There, the men discover Gen. Waverly (Dean Jagger), their commander in World War II, has a quaint country inn that is failing and plot a holiday extravaganza to save the day.

“A Very Happy Yule Log”: Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, 5 p.m. Cozy up with this traditional yule log.

“DreamWorks Trolls Holiday”: NBC, 7 p.m. An encore airing of the special that first aired just after Thanksgiving. In this animated special, Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake and Zooey Deschanel reprise their voice roles from last year's feature film Trolls.

“How Murray Saved Christmas”: NBC, 7:30 p.m. Based on Mike Reiss’ (“The Simpsons”) bestselling children’s book, this is a half-hour animated holiday musical special.

The story centers on a cranky deli owner, Murray Weiner (Jerry Stiller), who is forced to fill in for Santa (Kevin Michael Richardson) one Christmas and, with the help of Edison Elf (Sean Hayes), does a weirdly wonderful job. Jason Alexander, Dennis Haysbert and John Ratzenberger also provide voices.

“Beauty and the Beast”: ABC, 8 p.m. In this tale as old as time, beautiful, spirited young Belle discovers that you can't judge a book by its cover when she meets an enchanted prince trapped in the body of a fearsome beast.

“American Masters: This Is Bob Hope” PBS, 9 p.m. Sunday “American Masters” takes a long and loving look at Bob Hope’s storied life and career, from his early days in vaudeville to the Pepsodent-sponsored radio show that made him a household name to his heroic devotion to the USO and onward into entertainment history.

“It’s a Wonderful Life”: NBC, 8 p.m. James Stewart and Donna Reed star in Frank Capra’s 1946 classic about a man on the brink of ending it all who gets a second chance after finding out what life would be like without him, thanks to the aid of a kindly guardian angel. “ ‘Last Tango in Halifax’ Holiday Special”: PBS, 8 p.m.

Caroline tells Gillian the truth about why she took the new job. Gillian’s mounting guilt over Eddie’s death drives her to make a life-changing decision. On the night of Celia’s play, a twist of fate means Alan is forced to confront his fears.

24 Hours of “A Christmas Story” TBS and TNT, begin-

ning at 8 p.m. Ralphie’s quest for that Red Ryder BB gun in this 1983 classic just never gets old.

College Football: Hawaii Bowl; ESPN, 8:30 p.m. Live. The University of Houston and Fresno State get to spend Christmas Eve at Aloha Stadium in Honolulu for the 2017 Hawaii Bowl.

Monday “Christmas With the Duke”: AMC, beginning at 9 a.m.

Make it a John Wayne Christmas, with back-to-back airings of the Duke’s best, including “Big Jake,” “The Shootist,” “Cahill U.S. Marshal,” “Rio Bravo,” “The Sons of Katie Elder,” “The Cowboys” (45th anniversary) and “El Dorado”

NBA Basketball: ESPN, ABC & TNT, beginning at noon. Live.

Christmas Day is always big for the NBA, and there are five games under the tree. Things tip off at New York City’s Madison Square Garden as the Philadelphia 76ers visit the Knicks on ESPN. Action switches over to ABC with a tripleheader featuring the Cleveland Cavaliers at the Golden State Warriors, the Washington Wizards at the Boston Celtics and the Houston Rockets at the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Minnesota Timberwolves are at the L.A. Lakers in the nightcap on TNT. NFL Football: NBC, NFL Network & ESPN, beginning at 4:20 p.m. Live. A Christmas Day NFL doubleheader begins with the Pittsburgh Steelers at the Houston Texans on NBC and NFL Network. Then the Oakland Raiders visit the Philadelphia Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field for the season finale of ESPN’s “Monday Night Football.”

“Winter Wedding”: UP TV, 7 p.m. Original film. When Hallie and Lucas get engaged, they hope for a tropical beach wedding, but their dream destination is booked solid for the next year. While both parents argue over wedding plans, the couple decide to have a winter wedding at Lucas’ snowy mountain lodge.

But their love is tested by the stress of keeping their feuding families happy. Stars Andrea

Bowen (“Desperate Housewives”) and Susan Walters (“The Vampire Diaries,” “The Young and the Restless”).

“When Calls the Heart: The Christmas Wishing Tree”: Hallmark Channel, 8 p.m.

Original film. A loved one returns, Christmas spirit is renewed and children’s wishes are granted in this Christmas movie from Hallmark’s heartwarming period drama “When Calls the Heart.” When Elizabeth’s fiancé, Jack, comes home on a surprise leave, he brings a young Mountie desperately searching for Christmas inspiration. The people of Hope Valley work together to aid this young man with the help of an enchanted Wishing Tree. Stars Erin Krakow, Lori Loughlin, Daniel Lissing, Jack Wagner, Pascale Hutton and Kavan Smith.

“Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!”: NBC, 8 p.m. Chuck Jones directed this classic animated special based on Dr. Seuss’ beloved book. Boris Karloff both voices the Grinch and serves as narrator, with June Foray voicing Cindy Lou Who. “Doctor Who”: BBC America, 9 p.m. This year’s “Doctor Who” Christmas special, titled “Twice Upon a Time,” is Peter Capaldi's final episode as the Doctor. Also in the cast are Pearl Mackie as Bill Potts, Mark Gatiss as a World War I soldier and David Bradley playing the First Doctor.

“Holiday Baking Championship”: Food Network, 9 p.m. Judges Duff Goldman, Nancy Fuller and Lorraine Pascale welcome former Baking Championship contestants for a second chance at victory. The familiar faces must tackle two rounds of tough new challenges, including desserts inspired by real letters to Santa Claus, and then they must assemble cupcakes into one big edible Christmas tree. On the line is a $10,000 prize. “ ‘Call the Midwife’ Holiday Special”: PBS, 9 p.m. Join the midwives as they battle snow, ice, power cuts and frozen pipes to provide patient care during the coldest winter in 300 years. Valerie helps a young couple who experience a traumatic birth, and Sister Julienne tries to reunite a family.

Tuesday “The Godfather” Marathon: AMC, beginning at 9 a.m.

Here’s an offer you can’t refuse. Spend the day with the Corleone family as AMC presents a marathon of Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather” (1972) and “The Godfather, Part II” (1974).

College Football: ESPN, beginning at 1:30 p.m. Live.

ESPN airs a trio of college football bowl games today with the Zaxby’s Heart of Dallas Bowl at Cotton Bowl Stadium, the Quick Lane Bowl from Ford Field in Detroit and the Cactus Bowl from Chase Field in Phoenix.

“Happy New Year, Charlie Brown”: ABC, 8 p.m. The Peanuts gang is ringing in the new year, and Marcie and Peppermint Patty are throwing a big New Year’s Eve bash. But Charlie Brown still has 1,131 pages of Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” to finish before holiday break is over, even though he desperately hopes the little red-haired girl will accept his invitation to celebrate with the gang. Will Tolstoy be Charlie’s only date for the party?

“Rudolph’s Shiny New Year”: ABC, 9 p.m. Father Time sends Santa a message telling him that the Baby New Year, Happy, is missing — and without Happy, it’ll remain the old year forever. But once again, the weather is foggy and snowing, so Rudolph’s the only reindeer for the job. And when Rudolph learns that evil Eon is also searching for Happy so that he can live forever, he enlists the help of One Million B.C., Sir 1023 and 1776, to search for the baby through the islands of the Archipelago of Last Years and ensure a Happy New Year.

“The 40th Annual Kennedy Center Honors”: CBS, 9 p.m.

Dancer Carmen de Lavallade, singer Gloria Estefan, hip-hop artist LL Cool J, TV writer Norman Lear and recording artist Lionel Richie are the honorees celebrated at this ceremony held at the Kennedy Center Opera House in Washington, D.C.

“Married at First Sight: Jamie and Doug Plus One”: Lifetime, 10 p.m. Two back-to-back episodes will air on Tuesdays beginning tonight. The series follows Jamie and Doug Hehner, who appeared on “Married at First Sight” three years ago. Though their relationship wasn’t exactly a fairy tale, their lives will be forever changed as they welcome their new daughter, Henley Grace. The series follows their “new normal,” with all the ups and downs of parenthood.

Wednesday “EA Madden NFL 18 Challenge”: The CW, 8 p.m. This special, a joint venture between The CW, Electronic Arts Inc. and the National Football League, chronicles competitive tournament action and behind-the-scenes highlights as eight world-class players compete in the Madden NFL 18 Challenge. This tournament shows what goes on inside the intense world of competitive gaming and profiles the top players of one of the top video games of all time.

“Vikings”: History, 9 p.m.

Lagertha is betrayed, and Bjorn must find a way to support the distraught queen.

Floki and his settlers arrive in a new land, but it is far from what they expected.

“Nova”: PBS, 9 p.m. Investigate how an asteroid vanquished the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Join scientists as they drill into the impact crater and, for the first time, reconstruct the hell on earth that unfolded in the minutes, hours and months after the impact.

“Knightfall”: History, 10 p.m.

A pagan helps Landry search his past. Gawain conducts a murder investigation. Princess Isabella is betrayed.

Thursday “Movie Night With Karlie Kloss”: Freeform, 6:30 p.m.

New series. Supermodel, tech guru and fashion icon Karlie Kloss invites her celeb friends over to watch beloved films. A few of the famous faces stopping by for a night of movies, games, baking and fun include tennis star Serena Williams, Kendall Jenner, Rachel Bilson (Nashville), ballet dancer Fabrice Calmels, Ruby Rose (”Orange Is the New Black”) and magician Joel Ward.

“The Menendez Murders: Erik Tells All”: A&E, 10 p.m. Series finale. A&E’s documentary series that re-examines the infamous 1989 parricide case wraps up tonight.

Friday “Chrisley Knows Best” Marathon: USA Network, beginning at 6 a.m. Although Season 5 just ended, you can still get your Chrisley fix with this marathon of episodes from the reality series.

Saturday “Pitch Perfect 2”: FXX, 8 p.m.

A humiliating mishap leads to a suspension for the Barden Bellas in this 2015 sequel to “Pitch Perfect.” Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson and Hailee Steinfeld star.

“A Royal New Year’s Eve”: Hallmark Channel, 8 p.m.

Original film. A struggling fashion designer meets a struggling model, and they hit it off. But when she learns he is actually a prince forced into proposing to his witchy girlfriend before ascending the throne, she helps him plan an upcoming royal ball and experience the average-guy activities he’s been denied due to his royal station. But as their friendship blossoms, it’ll take the power of true love to ring in the new year.

“Web Cam Girls”: Lifetime, 8 p.m. Original film. Although fictitious, Lifetime’s latest original serves as a cautionary reminder of what not to do online. When Alex Hiles’ rebellious cousin Carolyn vanishes, Alex fears the worst. Against Alex’s advice, Carolyn has been “camming” lately for extra cash, and Alex suspects she broke the rules and met one of her clients. No one believes her, though, and it’s up to Alex to track down and ultimately face the predator who has been kidnapping web cam girls. The film features Arianne Zucker.

E9

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

BRIAN SIRIMATUROS TNS

BRIAN SIRIMATUROS TNS

Visitors to Valcartier Winter Park wait to ride the inner tube lift. Just plop down and belts will take you to the top.

Find art galleries, gift shops, restaurants and holiday decorations into February along the brick streets of the Petit Champlain.

QUEBEC CITY IN WINTER: A GLORIOUS WONDERLAND Eating and drinking one’s way around this snow-covered capital leaves a warm and fuzzy feeling

BY AMY BERTRAND

T

QUEBEC CITY

he castlelike chateau dominates the landscape, snowcovered and majestic. The St. Lawrence River undulates under frozen ice caps, back and forth, forward and backward. The charming shops line snowy streets with hints of brick and cobblestone poking through. Quebec City in winter weaves a spectacular spell of sheer magic.

Its mix of architecture, history, art and French culture make the Canadian pro-

vincial capital feel like Europe, at half the travel time and a fraction of the cost. One of North America’s oldest European settlements, Quebec City may be rooted in its French heritage, but it has clearly created its own identity.

“It’s not Europe, but it sure does look like it,” said our guide, Tony Gagnon, who gives tours with Il etait une Fois Kebec. He speaks both English and French fluently, as do most people in the tourism sector in Quebec. But the native language is French. “I always say the best way to see Quebec is to eat and drink your way around,” said Gagnon.

With that in mind, I’d recommend

If you go What to wear: You’ll need thermal underwear, wool socks, winter boots (the serious kind; don’t think you can get away with Uggs), a heavy coat, a hat and gloves. We were able to walk 5 to 8 miles a day without being too cold in this gear.

More info: quebecregion.com/en starting your visit with a dinner at Ciel, for “sky” (Cielbistrobar.com), on the trendy Grande-Allee (clear weather is a must, as are reservations on a weekend). It’s not

just another rotating restaurant on the upper floor of a tall building. Its menu is a successfully eclectic twist on French cuisine.

But the reason to visit the restaurant are the views, especially in winter: A 360degree look at the river, mountains and city. The St. Lawrence River, which was important for Quebec City both commercially and historically with the military, has tides that keep the ice caps flowing all winter long. They also cause it to flow forward and backward. It’s a sight to behold, especially from 28 stories up.

All around are historic buildings — SEE QUEBEC • E10

Often called the most photographed hotel in the world, the Fairmont Le Chauteau Frontenac sits on the Dufferin Terrace and has more than 600 rooms.

BRIAN SIRIMATUROS TNS

‘FRANCE IS A FEAST’: PHOTO EXHIBIT CELEBRATES JULIA CHILD Museum depicts chef’s life in Paris, before TV fame

BY ERIC RISBERG YOUNTVILLE

Mention Julia Child and the image that comes to mind is a tall woman with a spoon in one hand, saying in a high voice, “Bon appétit!”

That was Child in her heyday as a 1960s TV show host teaching Americans the art of French cooking.

But a new photo exhibit at California’s Napa Valley Museum Yountville documents her life in France in the years before she hosted one of America’s most popular TV cooking shows.

Child, a graduate of Smith College, worked during World War II for the agency that was the predecessor of the CIA. In 1946,

she married Paul Child, who worked as a cultural attache at the U.S. embassy in Paris while his wife learned how to cook at the famed Le Cordon Bleu cooking school, subsequently studying with several famous chefs.

That period of her life was documented by Paul Child and is the subject of the show, “France Is a Feast: The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child.” The exhibit was inspired and shown in conjunction with the release of the book “France Is a Feast” by Paul Child’s great-nephew, Alex Prud’homme, and Katie Pratt, the Childs’ longtime friend, who also curated the exhibit.

The exhibit features 60 rarely seen black-and-white photographs taken between 1948 and 1954, along with notebooks, logs, letters and a Rolleiflex camera that

Paul Child liked to use because it allowed him to look down and capture people unobtrusively.

“Julia and Paul loved France, especially Paris,” said Pratt. She explained that the couple often took walks on weekends, and Paul would look for subjects that appealed to him, including architecture, rivers, fishermen, children and cats. Since Julia was 6 foot 2, she could help him take pictures by blocking the sun. Her role, as she told Pratt, often was that of a prop.

Other pictures range from her early cooking years to art shots like one of her legs in a telephone booth beneath a bright light. Photos of daily life show her looking down from the top of a spiral staircase, sitting in their living room with their cat, picnicking, and on their many trips traveling the countryside

PAUL CHILD AP

Julia Child in Cassis, France, part of the exhibit “France Is a Feast — The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child,” at the Napa Valley Museum.

visiting castles. On the back wall of the exhibit is a large “selfie” of Paul and Julia sitting on their porch in Marseille, having a lunch of wine and mussels. Also in the exhibit is a cameo (nude) silhouette of Julia looking out a window with a reflection in a mirror.

Through his work at the embassy, Paul met and was influenced by many photographers of the day, including Edward Weston, Man Ray and Brassai. Through Pierre Gassmann, the master printer who founded Pictorial Service and did Paul’s darkroom work, he met and was influenced by Henri Cartier Bresson and Robert Capa.

Prud’homme said Paul was “talented, methodical in his work and happened to be in the right place at the right time.” He said his best pictures “combine abstraction and reality with SEE CHILD • E10

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BAJA CALENDAR Tijuana: New Year’s Eve Party: Dec. 31.

This year, the New Year’s Eve party at Grand Hotel Tijuana features three ballrooms with three musical groups, a four-course dinner and open bar. $109 adults; $79 ages 4-12 (childcare is available). A special room rate is available for attendees. Information: From the U.S., call: (664) 681 7000, ext. 4260, or visit grandhoteltj.com Rosarito: New Year’s Eve Gala: Dec. 31. This annual party at Rosarito Beach Hotel & Resort features live music, dancing and a gala buffet dinner. $89 for adults, $49 for children; call for information about New Year’s Eve package with overnight lodging and two adult tickets to the gala. Information: From the U.S., call: (866) 7672748 or visit rosaritobeachhotel.com Ensenada: Carnaval de Ensenada 2018: Feb. 8-13. The Ensenada Carnival is a centuries-old tradition featuring six days of parades and nights of endless party. Each of the six days of Carnival has a special meaning with different themes and varying activities.

More information: ensenada.net Tijuana: Café Tacvba: 8 p.m. Feb. 17.

Rubén Albarrán and his eclectic alt rock band, touring in support of its latest studio album, “Jei Beibi,” will perform at Tijuana’s Il Foro. Tickets range from about $20 to $77. More information: servieventos.com.mx Mexicali: Ricardo Montaner: 8 p.m.

Feb. 17. Latin pop artist Ricardo Montaner will perform in concert at Mexicali’s Centro Estatal de las Artes (CEART). Tickets range from about $51 to $149. More information and registration: boletos.taquillaexpress.com/ eventos Tijuana: Jorge Drexler: 8 p.m. Feb. 18.

Singer-songwriter (and TED2017 presenter) Jorge Drexler will perform a concert at the Teatro Zaragoza in Tijuana, as part of his “Poetry, Music and Identity” tour. Tickets range from about $35 to $80. More information: boletos.taquillaexpress.com/eventos Rosarito Art Fest: May 26, 27. This annual family-friendly festival features a mixture of fine artists and craft artisans, live music and food vendors at Rosarito’s CEART (Centro Estatal de las Artes Rosarito); admission is free. rosaritoartfest.com Todos Santos: Annual Open Studios Tour: Feb. 10, 11. Artists of every discipline — painters, sculptors, photographers, muralists, jewelers, printmakers, collage artists, potters, wood turners and more — participate in the Open Studios Tour. All proceeds benefit the children’s art programs at the Palapa Society of Todos Santos, A.C. artistsoftodossantos.com Tijuana: Centro Cultural Tijuana (CECUT): Tijuana’s cultural center is open Tuesdays through Sundays. $4 admission; special event tickets vary; admission to the aquarium is about $1.50 to $2.50; botanic garden admission is free. Paseo de Los Héroes and Francisco Javier Mina, Zona Rio, Tijuana. cecut.gob.mx

Events are subject to change or cancellation. Please confirm information with event organizer before booking your trip. To submit Baja California events information, email at least two weeks in advance to cynthia.zanone@sduniontribune.com

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • DECEMBER 24, 2017

QUEBEC FROM E9 Parliament, CathedralBasilica of Notre-Dame, the Citadelle — but it’s the area with no buildings that caught my attention: the snowy fields of the Plains of Abraham. In the summer, it’s a 240-acre green space commemorating the 1759 battle between the French and British empires in North America. It includes gardens, greenhouses and a museum that tells the story of the battle. But in the winter, especially from above, it’s just fields and fields of snow. You can take a guided snowshoe tour or cross-country skiing tour on its trails. Or skate on its rink. Skis, snowshoes and skates are all available for rent if you want to tour on your own. (Theplainsofabraham.ca) Winter may seem like an odd time to travel here, and indeed I’m sure Quebec City is lovely in the other seasons, but the wonders of winter, with 4 feet of snow covering everything, gave it a magical, pristine feeling. Winter wonderland isn’t just an expression. The average yearly snowfall is over 13 feet, and snow is usually on the ground from Thanksgiving to April.

BRIAN SIRIMATUROS TNS

The view from the funicular railway, descending from the Dufferin Terrace at the Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac and heading down to the Petit Champlain neighborhood in Quebec City. nearly everything. (carnaval.qc.ca)

Outside the walls

The Chateau

Called the “most photographed hotel in the world” by several tourist websites, the Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac (fairmont.com/ Frontenac/Quebec-City) sits on the Dufferin Terrace, built near the Citadelle and towering above the river. It’s the most prominent feature in the Quebec skyline, and it first opened in 1893. Portions were added over the years, so it now hosts 611 upscale hotel rooms, a number of conference rooms and restaurants as well as a spa. It’s undergoing a renovation that blends its charming past with modern amenities. The rooms, which start at about $309 Canadian during the 2018 Winter Carnival, aren’t large but are well appointed, and the service is impeccable.

Outside the hotel sits an ice-skating rink (bring your own skates) where kids can play hockey until the wee hours and warm up with a hot cocoa at the Au 1884 coffee shop. Get tickets there ($3 Canadian each) for the famous toboggan next door.

Grab your sled and haul it up a fairly steep hill. An attendant helps you situate every-

BRIAN SIRIMATUROS TNS

The rabbit poutine from Le Lapin Saute in Quebec City features Perron Cheddar cheese curds and twomustard or thyme and garlic sauce. thing, but don’t forget to take in the view of the gorgeous St. Lawrence River, because you won’t notice it as you fly at 70 mph down the ride, landing right back at the coffee shop.

Aside from the ornate beauty inside the hotel’s common areas, its location is the big draw. It is within walking distance of Parliament, the parks that host the Winter Carnival, the shops and restaurants along Rue St. Louis and Rue St. Jean and a funicular (an angled elevator built in 1879) ride to the Petit Champlain, the lower area near the river and my favorite part of the city.

As soon as your foot hits the brick streets of the Petit Champlain, you know you are in for a treat. To the right, rows of stone buildings house adorable shops (some, kitschy and touristy, some with wares by true artisans) and quaint restaurants. To

the left, a pub that looks straight out of a Dickens novel, with stone walls, a cozy fireplace and a friendly bartender. Straight ahead, more shops, restaurants and ice sculptures leading to a park with cannons aimed toward the river. The streets stay decorated for Christmas throughout the winter.

Stroll down the street ahead and turn left to enter an open courtyard known as Place Royale.

The site of the first permanent French settlement in North America, Place Royale is full of history, starting in the early 1600s. On the square you’ll find Notre-Dame-desVictoires, the oldest stone church in North America, built in 1688. According to our guide, Gagnon, it takes more than two years to book a wedding there.

Just past that, stop to admire one of the city’s gorgeous murals. The 420square-meter Fresque des Quebecois mural recounts the story of Quebec City and pays homage to historic figures, authors, artists and even hockey players.

The Carnival

Designated a UNESCO World Heritage site, Old Quebec is the only walled city north of Mexico. And the area inside those walls is surprisingly walkable, even when it’s 0 degrees out. But even for Canadians, the winters can get long, so Quebec City leaders decided to do something to make the end of winter a little more exciting.

After being held intermittently since 1894, the Carnaval de Quebec has been celebrated annually since 1955.

The two-week event (Jan. 26 to Feb. 11) takes place in several parks in the city, most fairly close to one another.

One area contains only ice sculptures. Another has an area for dance, music concerts and drama performances. Another, a hockey shooting contest, ax throwing and more. The carnival lasts a couple of weeks and features a number of noteworthy events, such as the ice canoe race, singles night, snow sliding and pond hockey. For 15 Canadian dollars, an effigy you attach to your coat gets you into

As fascinating as the city is, it’s worth it to spend a day or more in the country. We drove about 30 minutes to Villages Vacances Valcartier.

The drive alone, lined with evergreens topped with snow, is breathtaking.

Valcartier is a lodge with an indoor water park, hotel rooms and two winter attractions you don’t want to miss: an ice hotel and the Winter Playground, often called Winter Park.

Think of a ski resort, only the runs are not for skiing but for tubing. And instead of scary lifts, there is an awkward pulley system where you plop down on a moving inner tube and tote another along with you. I may have possibly missed the tube a few times, to the extreme laughter of my family and friends.

Nearly 30 slopes make up the park. Some are pretty basic downhill sledding.

Others use round rafts of eight people that spin or fly over dips and valleys. Then there is Everest, 110 feet in the air and reaching speeds of almost 50 mph.

Yes, you needed to bundle up. Yes, your heart will thud heavily in anticipation of even the smallest slopes, but unlike skiing, this requires no lessons, so the whole family can have a blast (there is a separate area for the littlest kids). (Valcartier.com) Winter Park sits behind the Village Valcartier hotel.

Just a ways down, also behind the hotel, sits Hotel de Glace, the world-famous ice hotel. It appears first as four separate igloos. One is a welcome hall, another is a wedding chapel, then the grand reception hall. Behind it, you’ll find a labyrinth of hallways connecting 41 rooms.

It takes 50 workers about six weeks to rebuild the hotel every year, starting in December, and every year it is different. More than 30,000 tons of snow and 500 tons of ice are needed to create this 32,000-square-foot masterpiece.

Some rooms are basic: just a bed made of ice with a furry mattress on top. The suites, though, have elaborate carvings of owls, Inuit people, Santa Claus and more on their walls. There is also a hot tub and sauna area.

I was considering staying here but honestly chickened out. What if I froze? What if I couldn’t sleep? Where do you go to the bathroom? Turns out, each room comes with a room at the main hotel for just those sorts of issues.

Rooms start at $259 Canadian.

You can take a guided tour of the ice hotel for a fee. (hoteldeglace-canada.com)

Tourist attractions

Open year-round, the

spectacular Montmorency Falls Park is just a 15-minute drive from downtown Quebec City. With temperatures well, well below freezing, I expected the falls to be frozen, but amid the snowy scenery, across a frozen and snowcovered lake, the falls still gushed.

At 272 feet tall, they are taller than Niagara Falls (but not as wide). Start at the visitor center, where those who can’t stand the cold can sit inside and stare out picture windows at the magnificent falls. Or spend about $12 and take a cable car up the cliff. As you exit, take a short trail to a lookout where you can get sprayed with the water or another trail that takes a suspended bridge from one side of the falls to the other. In cold weather, you can go ice climbing next to the falls. In warmer weather, zipline across them. (sepaq.com/montmorencyfalls)

The food

Poutine — french fries smothered in gravy and topped with cheese curds — is the most well-known Quebec specialty. If you ask Quebec City locals where to go, they’ll suggest both Ashton, a fast-food chain, and Le Chic Shack, a burger joint next to Chateau Frontenac, as the places to try them. I didn’t find a poutine I didn’t like.

But we found more specialties we loved: BeaverTail and maple syrup taffy. A BeaverTail, or queues de castor, is a pastry covered in all sorts of sweet goodness, almost like an open-faced doughnut. We first spotted them at the Carnival, which is also the first place we sampled the taffy. Servers line up behind a flat counter of snow, on which they ladle maple syrup in a line. You wait a few minutes, then use a wooden stick to wrap the ooey goodness around it.

Heaven. Messy, but divine.

And how can we forget crepes? In Old Quebec, it seems you can find a creperie around just about every corner. On one cold, snowy night after dining at an Italian restaurant, Le Parmesan, we wandered a few streets over to Le Casse-Crepe Breton, on Rue St. Jean. We sat down at a booth, stone walls around us, window fogged by the toasty warmth. We wanted only sweet crepes, we told the server. She returned with an enormous one filled with strawberries and chocolate, one with butter and sugar and one with the Canadian staple, maple syrup. As I sat around looking at my family, on the spur-of-themoment stop, enjoying the quaint shop, I realized that our guide was truly right. The best way to see Quebec is to eat and drink your way around it.

Bertrand writes for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

If you go France Is a Feast: Julia Child photo exhibit through Feb. 18 at Napa Valley Museum Yountville, 55 Presidents Circle, Yountville; www.napavalleymuseum.org or (707) 944-0500. Open Wednesday-Sunday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.

Adults, $10.

CHILD FROM E9 a narrative behind them.

For example, a photo of hanging laundry represents the people that wear the clothes even if the people aren’t in the clothes in the photo. On the one hand, they are a formal study of shape and texture and light and dark, but on the other hand, they tell a story about

ERIC RISBERG AP

Two of the images on display in the exhibit of rarely seen photographs of Julia Child, taken in Paris by her husband, Paul Child, between 1948 and 1954. the people that used that laundry — looking at laundry is like peeping through a keyhole.”

Both Pratt and Prud’homme said the Childs — he died in 1994, she in 2004 — would have loved the exhibit. “Paul was a modest guy, but I think he was

ambitious for his work,” said Prud’homme. “He had several shows. Edward Steichen picked some of his pictures for MOMA,” New York’s Museum of Modern Art.

Risberg writes for The Associated Press.