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puresingui's review against another edition
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
pbobrit's review against another edition
3.0
A well written but thoroughly depressing book about love, specifically about two married Parisian women who are having affairs with a psychoanalyst and a writer. The book is cleverly structured, made up of short vignettes of the main protagonists lives and the course of the affairs, (The structure of the book may or may not have been based on a game of domino's). As I said a well written book, but none of the characters are particularly sympathetic.
re_do_876's review against another edition
challenging
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
amy_creates's review against another edition
4.0
A quick and enjoyable read. Divorced psychiatrist Thomas Le Gall is treating married psychiatrist Anna Stein (Stan) who has fallen in love with writer Yves Janvier. Thomas Le Gall falls in love with married Louise Blum (Romain). The best chapter is the one when Stan realizes that his wife is having an affair with Yves and attends a conference where Yves is giving a talk on foreignness. One side of the page is Yves definition of foreignness and the other column is Stan's feelings about Yves. I enjoyed the novelty of reading the text in this way.
sarahjsnider's review against another edition
4.0
Two parallel love affairs, illustrated in light sketches that retain depth and feeling.
danni_faith's review against another edition
5.0
Perfection!
4/6/2018 Having just recently re-read this book, I have a clearer perspective on why I love it. I read this novel for the first time six years ago as a senior in high school, which is around the time I started reading more literary fiction. This novel is one of the first adult fiction novels I had ever read and for that it will always be special to me.
I read this novel in English, and I applaud the translator for her excellent work. This novel blends tenderness/intimacy, the highbrow, and the banal with elegance, resulting in a story that is equal parts charming and thought-provoking. Thomas, Yves, Anna, and Louise feel like real people who are experiencing real emotion. I think this book is for anyone who is interested in reading about how love works in the lives of older adults. The juxtaposition of the two relationships offer insight into the risk, whimsy, and endurance of love. As before I would have shouted from the mountaintops that everyone read this novel, I now feel that this novel is for a select few. If you enjoy heartwarming stories about love and also intellectual more deattached examinations of romantic relationships, I would suggest you pick up this novel.
4/6/2018 Having just recently re-read this book, I have a clearer perspective on why I love it. I read this novel for the first time six years ago as a senior in high school, which is around the time I started reading more literary fiction. This novel is one of the first adult fiction novels I had ever read and for that it will always be special to me.
I read this novel in English, and I applaud the translator for her excellent work. This novel blends tenderness/intimacy, the highbrow, and the banal with elegance, resulting in a story that is equal parts charming and thought-provoking. Thomas, Yves, Anna, and Louise feel like real people who are experiencing real emotion. I think this book is for anyone who is interested in reading about how love works in the lives of older adults. The juxtaposition of the two relationships offer insight into the risk, whimsy, and endurance of love. As before I would have shouted from the mountaintops that everyone read this novel, I now feel that this novel is for a select few. If you enjoy heartwarming stories about love and also intellectual more deattached examinations of romantic relationships, I would suggest you pick up this novel.
juliechristinejohnson's review
4.0
To appreciate this novel is to understand that it is written with Gallic sense and sensibility. That is to say, it is not a linear story with a predictable arc that reaches a climax and culminates in a resolution. In substance and style it is a novel of process, of conversation, of debate. It is, like the culture which it represents, maddening, thoughtful, intriguing, and seductive.
To enjoy this novel is to not expect a romance or a comedy- for it is not- but to delight in the romantic or comedic moments when they occur.
To read this novel is to be reminded that none of us truly knows another's marriage, even that of a close friend, a sibling, or a colleague with whom you spend more time than your own spouse.
Enough About Love is a perfect title. It sound like a command, as in "Enough, already!" or "Let's not talk about it anymore!" It could be the plea of psychoanalyst Thomas Le Gall, who pays off a small villa in Italy by listening to the angst-ridden memories and confessions of his patients. It could be the irritated and guilty brush off of stunning Anna Stein, a just-forty psychiatrist and mother of two, to her husband, the devoted Stanislaus. It could be the impatient demand of lithe Louise Blum, hot-shot attorney, as she instructs her husband, biologist Romain Vidal, on the fine art of speech delivery. It could be the jaded sigh of esoteric writer Yves Janvier, disagreeing with the suggestion that his next novel should have "love" in the title, to attract more readers.
These characters' lives intersect; whether in a therapist's office, in a cafe, on a sidewalk, or in a bed, the smallest ripples of chance force waves of change. By meeting, they are each compelled to examine their belief in love and where it diverges from passion or converges on friendship.
Le Tellier manages to make you care about characters whose lives are vastly removed from most. These are exceptionally attractive, successful, well-read, well-bred Parisians- conditions that are determined by birth into France's upper-middle class, largely unavailable even to the hardest-working. The women live up to the impossible French notion of the ideal woman: she who brings home the bacon, fries it up in pan, and never lets Monsieur forget he's a man. The men are allowed more diversity: a paunch in the belly, a thinning pate, weaker of character and of heart. For this I fault the male and the French in Le Tellier and the American in me. Perhaps his French readers expect no less; I weary of female characters whose physical perfection turns them into caricatures.
Le Tellier, through his intellectual-elite characters, also brings out the question of Jewish identity and French remorse and guilt about the treatment of Jews in France during the Second World War. At times it is poignant, at times shocking how contemporary France embraces and rejects its Jewish past and present.
Considering the style of Enough About Love. There is enough conventional novel structure to seduce you into a story of love and infidelity. But anticipate being walked through a maze of literary flourishes: a chapter that is one long inventory of Anna's clothing purchases; a speech and a internal dialogue that run simultaneously for several pages, mirroring a game of Abkhazian dominoes- a game that takes on a life of its own within the story; a love sonnet comprised of forty distinct memories. All aspects- conventional and odd- are delivered by an anonymous and omniscient narrator that is so close to the characters' innermost identities it borders on the more intimate second person narrative.
This is a quick read, but it is not light. There is a beautiful economy of words that is so quintessentially French - I commend the translator Adriana Hunter for the conveying the precision and clarity of the French language in the rich and muddled mess of English.
Someday I will have the courage and time to tackle reading an Oulipo work in French. Le Tellier has been an Oulipo member for some twenty years. Enough About Love would be an encouraging place to start. There is enough familiar and straightforward storytelling to ease into the Oulipo experimental methods.
To enjoy this novel is to not expect a romance or a comedy- for it is not- but to delight in the romantic or comedic moments when they occur.
To read this novel is to be reminded that none of us truly knows another's marriage, even that of a close friend, a sibling, or a colleague with whom you spend more time than your own spouse.
Enough About Love is a perfect title. It sound like a command, as in "Enough, already!" or "Let's not talk about it anymore!" It could be the plea of psychoanalyst Thomas Le Gall, who pays off a small villa in Italy by listening to the angst-ridden memories and confessions of his patients. It could be the irritated and guilty brush off of stunning Anna Stein, a just-forty psychiatrist and mother of two, to her husband, the devoted Stanislaus. It could be the impatient demand of lithe Louise Blum, hot-shot attorney, as she instructs her husband, biologist Romain Vidal, on the fine art of speech delivery. It could be the jaded sigh of esoteric writer Yves Janvier, disagreeing with the suggestion that his next novel should have "love" in the title, to attract more readers.
These characters' lives intersect; whether in a therapist's office, in a cafe, on a sidewalk, or in a bed, the smallest ripples of chance force waves of change. By meeting, they are each compelled to examine their belief in love and where it diverges from passion or converges on friendship.
Le Tellier manages to make you care about characters whose lives are vastly removed from most. These are exceptionally attractive, successful, well-read, well-bred Parisians- conditions that are determined by birth into France's upper-middle class, largely unavailable even to the hardest-working. The women live up to the impossible French notion of the ideal woman: she who brings home the bacon, fries it up in pan, and never lets Monsieur forget he's a man. The men are allowed more diversity: a paunch in the belly, a thinning pate, weaker of character and of heart. For this I fault the male and the French in Le Tellier and the American in me. Perhaps his French readers expect no less; I weary of female characters whose physical perfection turns them into caricatures.
Le Tellier, through his intellectual-elite characters, also brings out the question of Jewish identity and French remorse and guilt about the treatment of Jews in France during the Second World War. At times it is poignant, at times shocking how contemporary France embraces and rejects its Jewish past and present.
Considering the style of Enough About Love. There is enough conventional novel structure to seduce you into a story of love and infidelity. But anticipate being walked through a maze of literary flourishes: a chapter that is one long inventory of Anna's clothing purchases; a speech and a internal dialogue that run simultaneously for several pages, mirroring a game of Abkhazian dominoes- a game that takes on a life of its own within the story; a love sonnet comprised of forty distinct memories. All aspects- conventional and odd- are delivered by an anonymous and omniscient narrator that is so close to the characters' innermost identities it borders on the more intimate second person narrative.
This is a quick read, but it is not light. There is a beautiful economy of words that is so quintessentially French - I commend the translator Adriana Hunter for the conveying the precision and clarity of the French language in the rich and muddled mess of English.
Someday I will have the courage and time to tackle reading an Oulipo work in French. Le Tellier has been an Oulipo member for some twenty years. Enough About Love would be an encouraging place to start. There is enough familiar and straightforward storytelling to ease into the Oulipo experimental methods.
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