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A review by jacki_f
Paris in Love by Eloisa James
3.0
This is a true story about an American romance writer who recovers from breast cancer and decides to relocate with her Italian husband and two teenage children to Paris for a year. The book is a collection of her thoughts and observations over the course of the year. It's written as a series of little vignettes and (as she freely admits) is essentially a collection of her Facebook and Twitter status updates over the course of the year, with the addition of a few longer pieces. The result is a severely disjointed book which talks about interesting sights in Paris, amusing anecdotes about her family, the odd recipe and reports from side trips within Europe without ever really doing anything in depth. Even though the book is short, it took me several days to read it and in fact I read another book at the same time (something I hardly ever do) because it simply wasn't holding my interest.
There are snippets from the book that I really liked but I felt that it was a lazy compilation of assorted thoughts and this was particularly annoying because the potential was there for so much more. The fact that she had been through breast cancer and also recently lost her mother (and a close friend) to cancer were obviously major incentives in her decision to go to France, but this was barely touched on until the very end of the book. The impact on her family is also something that you deduce as a reader rather than having her talk about in any depth. As a travel book it's slightly more successful (at the end she compiles a list of her favourite restaurants, museums and sights which is truly enticing) but again, this is only part of what the book is.
Also, the title really bugged me. Paris in Love? Why? Because she writes romance novels? It has nothing to do with the book!
There are better books about the experience of moving to Paris as an expat, for example: [b:Almost French: Love and a New Life in Paris|331695|Almost French Love and a New Life in Paris|Sarah Turnbull|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1309206862s/331695.jpg|902805], [b:A Family in Paris: Stories of Food, Life and Adventure|10447523|A Family in Paris Stories of Food, Life and Adventure|Jane Paech|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1310354007s/10447523.jpg|15352268] or [b:The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School|880773|The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School|Kathleen Flinn|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1266665001s/880773.jpg|2654126].
There are snippets from the book that I really liked but I felt that it was a lazy compilation of assorted thoughts and this was particularly annoying because the potential was there for so much more. The fact that she had been through breast cancer and also recently lost her mother (and a close friend) to cancer were obviously major incentives in her decision to go to France, but this was barely touched on until the very end of the book. The impact on her family is also something that you deduce as a reader rather than having her talk about in any depth. As a travel book it's slightly more successful (at the end she compiles a list of her favourite restaurants, museums and sights which is truly enticing) but again, this is only part of what the book is.
Also, the title really bugged me. Paris in Love? Why? Because she writes romance novels? It has nothing to do with the book!
There are better books about the experience of moving to Paris as an expat, for example: [b:Almost French: Love and a New Life in Paris|331695|Almost French Love and a New Life in Paris|Sarah Turnbull|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1309206862s/331695.jpg|902805], [b:A Family in Paris: Stories of Food, Life and Adventure|10447523|A Family in Paris Stories of Food, Life and Adventure|Jane Paech|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1310354007s/10447523.jpg|15352268] or [b:The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School|880773|The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School|Kathleen Flinn|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1266665001s/880773.jpg|2654126].