Following on from Helen Constantine's hugely successful Paris Tales, the twenty-two short stories included in More Metro Tales take the reader on an fascinating journey around Paris by metro.

The journey begins at the Gare du Nord, stops at twenty underground stations along the way, and ends at Lamarck-Caulaincourt. Some of these stories actually take place in the metro itself, but most are to be found when you emerge above ground. They range from the 15th-century account of the miraculous Saint Genevieve, patron saint of Paris, through tales by favourite writers such as Zola, Simenon, and Maupassant, to Martine Delerm's evocation of the last hours of Modigliani's mistress, Jeanne Hebuterne.Gerard de Nerval evokes the thriving, bustling market in Les Halles in the 1850s; Colette recounts her involvement in a traffic accident near the Opera; Boulanger describes a blackly funny experience in Pere Lachaise.

Each story is illustrated with a black-and-white photograph and there is a map and suggested itinerary round the metro system. Readers will find familiar and unfamiliar writers here, but all are masterly writers of the short story and each evokes a different aspect of this endlessly intriguing and much-loved city, whether the traveller is on the metro or at home sitting in an armchair.

Follow-up to Helen Constantine's hugely successful Paris Tales

Writers include Colette, Honoré de Balzac, Guy de Maupassant, and Émile Zola

Each tale evokes a different aspect of this enchanting and much-loved city

Some stories have been translated for the first time

A suggested itinerary for the real or virtual traveller, a metro map, and photographs complement the stories

Introduction

Gare du Nord, Jacques Reda

Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, Julien Green

Summer Rain, Daniel Boulanger

A Little Accident, Colette

If it were Sunday, Annie Saumont

Facino Cane, Honore de Balzac

Rue des Larmes, Frederic Fajardie

Story, Paul Fournel

There or Elsewhere, Martine Delerm

Saint Genevieve, Jacques de Voragine

Expomodigliani.com, Martine Delerm

Minuet, Guy de Maupassant

Snow, Emile Zola

La Halle, Gerard de Nerval

Confronting the Present, Andree Chedid

The Cab, Theodore de Banville

The Little Restaurant at Ternes, Georges Simenon

Romance in the Metro, Claude Dufresne

The Neighbour in the Rue de Jarente, Cyrille Fleischman

The Landlady, Guy de Maupassant

La Butte Montmartre, Gerard de Nerval

Notes on the Metro

Notes on the Stories

Notes on the Authors

Selected Further Reading

Publisher's Acknowledgements

Map of metro

Edited and translated by Helen Constantine

Helen Constantine taught languages in schools until 2000, when she became a full-time translator. She has published two volumes of translated stories, Paris Tales and French Tales, and is currently editing a series of City Tales for Oxford University Press. She has translated Mademoiselle de Maupin by Théophile Gautier and Dangerous Liaisons by Choderlos de Laclos for Penguin. She is married to the writer David Constantine and with him edits the international magazine Modern Poetry in Translation.