This Provençal village with its little winding streets, on the road to the Alps, boasts a fine architectural heritage and basks in the memories created by the writer, Jean Giono. Its reputation as the Town of Books is unsurpassed!

The name Manosque conjures up all the promise of Provençal bliss. The narrow alleyways, the houses with their carved wooden doors, the atmosphere of privacy in the historic centre of the town... And then there’s the hinterland with its succession of hills and close horizons, of hilltop villages and sheep farms, bathed in an air of crystalline clarity under an ever blue sky.

Come to Manosque to escape from the over-exuberance of the coast. It is a small provincial town which has managed to hold on to its slow pace of life and its almost rustic soul. Just a boulevard which encircles the town and two or three avenues: they all lead to the medieval gates of Old Manosque with its tiny alleys and tranquil squares and its 18th and 19th century mansions, protected by fine period doors.

Jean Giono personifies this Provençal hedonism. The writer, born in 1895, so praised this mountainous area that nowadays many visit it just to tread in the author’s footsteps. And you can do just that from the Mont d’Or and the hill of Toutes Aures, which rise up over the town and serve as a backdrop to its brown roofs. And, most especially, there’s the Jean Giono Centre where exhibitions and archives bear witness to the greatest hours of the writer. Since those times, Manosque – and its environs – has styled itself ‘Town of Books’. In September of every year, the town shows that it deserves this title by hosting Les Correspondances, a festival where contemporary literature, through public readings, takes to the streets.