Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.66 AVERAGE
3.66 AVERAGE
Honestly I’m bored-may come back to it but I just don’t care enough right now
Fascinating time/place/people...underwhelming exploration thereof. After waffling between 2 and 3 stars, I settled on 3 stars because of the "fascinatings" listed above. However, I don't feel that the memoir-style or tedious prose added much illumination to Ernest and Hadley's relationship that I could not have gleaned from a straight-up biography. If anything, I feel like I understand Hadley less after reading The Paris Wife. To me, the purpose of a novel is to get at emotional truths about life, emotion, psychological knots--all those messy yet necessary aspects of human relationships--in a way that straight historical facts can't. The Paris Wife relied too much on historical veneer (fun as it was), stringing well-known facts about the culture of American ex-pats in Paris without delving far below the surface.
However, I'm unfamiliar enough with the 1920's Paris scene (outside of the film Midnight in Paris, heh) that I appreciated the opportunity to be a fly on the wall. Having avoided Ernest (mostly) since an ill-fated fling with Farewell to Arms in high school, I now have the urge to pick up A Moveable Feast and The Sun Also Rises. I've always had a sort of anti-crush on Mr. Hemingway, so I any book that can get me past my readerly grudges earns my gratitude.
However, I'm unfamiliar enough with the 1920's Paris scene (outside of the film Midnight in Paris, heh) that I appreciated the opportunity to be a fly on the wall. Having avoided Ernest (mostly) since an ill-fated fling with Farewell to Arms in high school, I now have the urge to pick up A Moveable Feast and The Sun Also Rises. I've always had a sort of anti-crush on Mr. Hemingway, so I any book that can get me past my readerly grudges earns my gratitude.
It was well written, but I thought Hadley was a very weak character. She got on my nerves. Ernest was an arrogant jerk. The overall tone was rather sad, but not much different than any of Hemingway's novels. Like many of Hemingway's novels, the main character suffered from depression and died in the end.
It's more of 3 1/2 stars. I just couldn't give it 4. It has some parts that were just hard for me to digest. Maybe because I wanted Hadley to so badly stand up to Ernest. Call him out in all his douchiness. Hahaha....but I truly loved the history of it.
adventurous
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I tried. It's beautifully written fanfic about Hemingway and his friends told from the perspective of his wife. Fun conceit, and while written beautifully, it just did not go anywhere. I was positively bored to death the entire time.
Interesting turn on perspectives to hear from Hadley. Although, I still don't understand how in the world she could love a man like that. Now I have to reread the Sun Also Rises.
This book somehow covered a wide swath of emotions. For the most part, it can be divided up into three sections: 1) the courting, 2) love in the marriage, 3) the affair (not a spoiler, as Hemingway is well known to have had 4 wives and multiple lovers).
At the start it read a whole lot like a fanfic of a romance with Ernest Hemingway, all the more so because it's written in Hadley's voice. But I suppose that's somewhat the point; we're supposed to be swept away with Hemingway, just as Hadley was, and in a way that doesn't seem quite real.
However, as we get into the thick of their marriage, we see things start to fall apart and their love becomes less idealized. The cracks are starting to show. More than anything I just felt a dull pang of sadness reading this portion (which makes up the majority of the book). Hadley pours her entire self into being Hemingway's support to such a degree that when he is gone for a month she nearly falls to pieces. She has few friends in Paris and the ones she does make are for the most part made through Hemingway. More than anything this part of her story read to me as a cautionary tale on the importance of having your own designs that extend beyond "save the man who will become a legend." And yet every time she had the opportunity to do more, be more, she turned it down to support Hem. I found it difficult to sympathize with her and wanted to shake her and tell her to just stop it. There were also incidences – such as the briefcase on the train one – that made me roll my eyes. Perhaps I'm being too harsh, but it seemed she didn't even know the very basics of traveling safely (i.e. rule number one: don't leave your things in public places without someone watching them). All this was made worse by the fact that she readily identified early on in their marriage that she was naïve and overly dependent –– and yet she still does nothing to change this.
I wasn't quite ready to call it quits with this book just yet, but I felt little sympathy for any of the characters and their actions, from Hemingway's self-destructive behavior to Hadley's ambivalence to action. It is a testament to the author's ability to conjure up powerfully evocative images of 1920s Paris that I not only continued to read, but found myself turning the pages excitedly. The final section of the book I greatly appreciated because it delved into Hadley's character in a way that gave her dimension and challenged her raison-d'être at its core. Who was she if she was no longer Hemingway's sole love, his single arm of support? And what would she do with a challenger in the ring?
Through these last 100 pages I wanted to scream and shout – I hated this woman who claimed to be Hadley's friend, and even more so because the second she entered the story I knew what would happen. And I hated Hemingway who treated his wife, who had completely hollowed herself out just to help him become who he had always wanted to be, as if she were old news. These last 100 pages saved the novel. As I cried on the train and strangers looked at me as if I were mad, I decided that the bravery of Hadley's ultimate decision and Hemingway's lifelong regret for his betrayal culminated into a dramatic and lasting shift in the power balance of their relationship –– making Hadley the character I had always wanted her to be and the man who sucked the air out of the room the one who could no longer stomach it.
At the start it read a whole lot like a fanfic of a romance with Ernest Hemingway, all the more so because it's written in Hadley's voice. But I suppose that's somewhat the point; we're supposed to be swept away with Hemingway, just as Hadley was, and in a way that doesn't seem quite real.
However, as we get into the thick of their marriage, we see things start to fall apart and their love becomes less idealized. The cracks are starting to show. More than anything I just felt a dull pang of sadness reading this portion (which makes up the majority of the book). Hadley pours her entire self into being Hemingway's support to such a degree that when he is gone for a month she nearly falls to pieces. She has few friends in Paris and the ones she does make are for the most part made through Hemingway. More than anything this part of her story read to me as a cautionary tale on the importance of having your own designs that extend beyond "save the man who will become a legend." And yet every time she had the opportunity to do more, be more, she turned it down to support Hem. I found it difficult to sympathize with her and wanted to shake her and tell her to just stop it. There were also incidences – such as the briefcase on the train one – that made me roll my eyes. Perhaps I'm being too harsh, but it seemed she didn't even know the very basics of traveling safely (i.e. rule number one: don't leave your things in public places without someone watching them). All this was made worse by the fact that she readily identified early on in their marriage that she was naïve and overly dependent –– and yet she still does nothing to change this.
I wasn't quite ready to call it quits with this book just yet, but I felt little sympathy for any of the characters and their actions, from Hemingway's self-destructive behavior to Hadley's ambivalence to action. It is a testament to the author's ability to conjure up powerfully evocative images of 1920s Paris that I not only continued to read, but found myself turning the pages excitedly. The final section of the book I greatly appreciated because it delved into Hadley's character in a way that gave her dimension and challenged her raison-d'être at its core. Who was she if she was no longer Hemingway's sole love, his single arm of support? And what would she do with a challenger in the ring?
Through these last 100 pages I wanted to scream and shout – I hated this woman who claimed to be Hadley's friend, and even more so because the second she entered the story I knew what would happen. And I hated Hemingway who treated his wife, who had completely hollowed herself out just to help him become who he had always wanted to be, as if she were old news. These last 100 pages saved the novel. As I cried on the train and strangers looked at me as if I were mad, I decided that the bravery of Hadley's ultimate decision and Hemingway's lifelong regret for his betrayal culminated into a dramatic and lasting shift in the power balance of their relationship –– making Hadley the character I had always wanted her to be and the man who sucked the air out of the room the one who could no longer stomach it.
challenging
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
emotional
informative
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is well written. It flows well and the facts are accurate. I found it painful, however, because Hemingway was self absorbed and self centered. I was angry through much of the book. The other real life characters were similar and talented and brilliant and I wonder if there isn’t a lesson in there about how the gifted dip into lives that are very different from the conventional. I was also amazed at how Hadley could be so generous to Hemingway despite how much he hurt her. I imagine that is true love but a character trait I do not possess. It makes me want to read his books to see how life I influenced art yet also not so as not to support his bad behavior to those who gave him their all.