Almost French: Love and a New Life in Paris Book

The author, an Australian television journalist, on a whim, heads to Paris to stay with a man, a French lawyer, that she's met only twice. The book is billed as a love story, though we actually see very little of Frederic, her future husband, other than brief caricatured appearances - after picking her up at the airport, he effortlessly whips up an elegant lunch, setting the table with crystal knife rests and an antique silver bowl filled with flowers. While contemplating the opulent table setting the author makes a profound observation that will be repeated throughout the book: "This must be how things are done in France."

We are also treated to such insights as 'French woman have no female friends' [due to French cultural pressures to be beautiful and sexually attractive, therefore all other women are perceived as a threat]. Okay. She also reaches the conclusion that the French 'like meat', and that one wouldn't dare serve, say, a veggie lasagna, at a dinner party.

This self-indulgent author whines and drones on about her difficulties adjusting to ex-pat life, illustrating with 'hilarious' anecdotal evidence such as wearing Doc Martens to an elegant cocktail party or brashly helping herself to champagne as the other guests wait for their hosts to arrive. We also get to hear her complain that Frederic's apartment, located in the lovely leafy suburb of Levallois, isn't located in the real Paris. [shockingly, after living with him for only 4 months, she starts to nag him to buy a place in the centre de ville. She, struggling to establish herself as a freelance journalist, with absolutely no income, actually whines that the 20 minute train ride to the center is inconvenient].

Annoying author aside, the book is clunky and poorly edited. It seems as though the author put together a collection of her rejected articles on ex-pat life and arranged them in chronological order and called it good. At times I felt that she tried to follow the general organization of Adam Gopnik's Paris to the Moon, but this book has nothing in the way of the charm or compelling insights that Gopnik so delightfully shared in his collection of essays.