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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
What an absolute dud of a novel - it certainly does not live up to the hype. Sally Jay yin's completely shallow and sadly lacks any redeeming qualities. While there are a handful of one-liners worthy of a short laugh, the majority is cringe-worthy reading. Do not bother with this one!
Like the memoir of a female Bertie Wooster, but without a benevolent valet to sort things out for her. It sort feels meandering but enjoyable, but at the end it does all come together very nicely, making the meandering make more sense in retrospect.
DNF. I can't tell if I didn't like this book because I wasn't in the mood for frivolity or if it really just wasn't very good. I read the first ... 60 pages? 80? and I was annoyed by it rather than charmed, which was really unexpected. Maybe it just wasn't the right time.
Oh, but I so desperately wanted to love this! The title, the cover, the premise - young American woman in Paris - but alas, I only ended up liking this.
This starts off strong: Sally-Jay Gorce is an expat in 1950's Paris without much purpose, unsure who she is, why she's there, and what she wants. She's having an affair with a married man, crushing on a man she knows from back home, and dyeing her hair various colours. So far so good. There's some delicious humour that I was devouring up at the beginning, particularly her sparring with Teddy (the married man).
However, it starts to veer off course. You know when you're talking to someone, and they keep babbling on about people you don't know? And they don't really tell you who they are, either? That's where it starts to lose its way. I'm a big stickler for only focusing on characters if they really add something to the story. Dickens gets away with it, due to the allegorical nature of his novels and each character representing something in society, whether it be an ill or a virtue; Shakespeare gets away with focusing on Mercutio and Benvolio for pretty much the first two acts of a play named after other people. Dundy....it doesn't quite work.
There's a twist near the end about one of her amours - a twist is hinted throughout, but not quite what -that left me a bit deflated to say the least. Frustratingly, Sally-Jay appears to have learned precisely nothing by the end of the novel which made this fun romp feel rather flippantly unfocused by the end. I'm used to my fair share of frustrating female protagonists - Jane Eyre, I'm looking at you - but they usually do learn something by the end; or if they don't really learn (now I'm looking at you, Catherine Earnshaw-slash-Linton) then they're spectacularly maddening. Had Sally-Jay's shenanigans amounted to something more substantial, then I'd have been a more satisfied reader. Still, fun enough when it hits the spot!
This starts off strong: Sally-Jay Gorce is an expat in 1950's Paris without much purpose, unsure who she is, why she's there, and what she wants. She's having an affair with a married man, crushing on a man she knows from back home, and dyeing her hair various colours. So far so good. There's some delicious humour that I was devouring up at the beginning, particularly her sparring with Teddy (the married man).
However, it starts to veer off course. You know when you're talking to someone, and they keep babbling on about people you don't know? And they don't really tell you who they are, either? That's where it starts to lose its way. I'm a big stickler for only focusing on characters if they really add something to the story. Dickens gets away with it, due to the allegorical nature of his novels and each character representing something in society, whether it be an ill or a virtue; Shakespeare gets away with focusing on Mercutio and Benvolio for pretty much the first two acts of a play named after other people. Dundy....it doesn't quite work.
There's a twist near the end about one of her amours - a twist is hinted throughout, but not quite what -that left me a bit deflated to say the least. Frustratingly, Sally-Jay appears to have learned precisely nothing by the end of the novel which made this fun romp feel rather flippantly unfocused by the end. I'm used to my fair share of frustrating female protagonists - Jane Eyre, I'm looking at you - but they usually do learn something by the end; or if they don't really learn (now I'm looking at you, Catherine Earnshaw-slash-Linton) then they're spectacularly maddening. Had Sally-Jay's shenanigans amounted to something more substantial, then I'd have been a more satisfied reader. Still, fun enough when it hits the spot!
I really wanted to like this book, but I couldn't get into it. I stopped reading half way through. I think my 20-year-old self would have loved it--I wish I had known about it back then.
Fell a bit flat for me. Was quite a boring read about a lot of characters I wasn't interested in, having lots of dinners. Found it a little hard to follow at times. Not my cup of tea.
You could file this alongside Betsy and the Great World and Our Hearts Were Young and Gay--young girl travels to Europe on her own. She explores France, meets interesting people, and in the process, finds herself.
And yet, it is completely different. Set and published in the 1950s, Sally Jay is a very different kind of heroine. There's sex (gasp!) and lots of alcohol and some unsavory characters. There are times where slapping her seems like the right approach to take. At the same time, you can't help falling in love with her exuberance.
The writing sparkles, and includes one of my new favorite closing sentences:
"It's the end, it's _end_. .! It's the last word.
It's zymotic."
Definitely recommended--and amazed that none of my goodreads friends have read this charmer.
And yet, it is completely different. Set and published in the 1950s, Sally Jay is a very different kind of heroine. There's sex (gasp!) and lots of alcohol and some unsavory characters. There are times where slapping her seems like the right approach to take. At the same time, you can't help falling in love with her exuberance.
The writing sparkles, and includes one of my new favorite closing sentences:
"It's the end, it's _end_. .! It's the last word.
It's zymotic."
Definitely recommended--and amazed that none of my goodreads friends have read this charmer.
Loved this from cover to cover. Funny, clever, laugh out loud moments. Effortlessly manages to capture both the coolness and the silliness of 1950s Paris - enjoying the characters while simultaneously taking a pot shot at itself. One to read again.
I read The Dud Avocado straight after Eve Babitz’s Sex and Rage - to me it was a perfect complimentary duo in terms of theme. Dundy’s book is an earlier set story of a naive American girl swept up in the complex world of 50s Paris. Sally Jay, for all her faults (and perhaps because of them) I found to be an endlessly likeable heroine. The supporting cast of characters also keep things lively, and the 300 or so pages flew by in a haze of jazz bars, cocktails and french villas.
What a zinger and sip of a fresh martini this book was. Loved this cult classic about a young American woman finding and losing herself in 1950s Paris. Sally Jay Gorce has one of the most memorable, clever voices in literature.