I am pretty sure that I heard about this book as part of last year's Paris in July. I bought it and then patiently waited for the right time to read, which ended up being last week!
We meet New Yorker Stella in Paris in 1983, her mother having just passed away. Stella's relationship with Celia St Vincent was difficult. Where Celia was flamboyant, Stella was quiet. Where Celia was the centre of society, Stella was a studious copy editor who preferred to live alone quietly. Needless to say, they clashed on many issues. When Celia dies, she leaves a small amount of money and an instruction. Go to Paris.
Usually she doesn't do what her mother says, but in this case she agrees and that is why she is in Paris. On her first day in Paris she is attracted to a small dress shop. The shop owner greets her as if she has been waiting for her and instructs her to buy a specific dress, which fits her as if it is made for her. However, when she hears the dress is 6000 francs she leaves the store. Eventually, however, she returns to the store where the owner gives her a deal. She can take the dress but she must then walk through the Tuileries to the Seine and then to the Pont des Arts, have champagne and oysters at Les Duex Magot an then go to the Musee du Jeu de Paume. After that, if she then wants to return the dress she can.
And so begin a series of events which change Stella's life in ways she can never imagine. She meets an older man called Jules who helps open her eyes to the joys of Paris, the sights, the sounds, the food and wine, the art and introduces her to many influential people, many of whom are real people from history. Along the way he sets her on a search for someone she never expects to find...her father.
One of the places that Stella finds herself is at the legendary bookstore, Shakespeare and Co and she soon becomes a Tumbleweed, someone who lives in the bookstore in exchange for helping out occasionally. She first went to the store as she became interested in the life of Victorine Meurent and was looking for a book about her. Victorine was originally a model to many famous artists including Edouard Manet. She then disappeared from history which in itself an injustice given that she has become a painter and had her worked displayed at the famous Salon something which was extremely difficult to achieve as a women. Despite this success, it was believed that none of her paintings survived. Now Stella is on the hunt to see if she can find any of Victorine's works. Being set in 1983 meant that Stella has to do old fashioned research like going to churches to find records, going to National archives etc. None of this just looking everything up on the internet.
As you might expect given that Reichl is a renowned cookbook writer, an editor, a restaurant critic and more, the food and wine related passages shine throughout this book, and there are a lot of them. Here's just one
Jules's wines were opened, decanted, fussed over. They both watched Olney take the first sip of the 1945 Romanee-Conti, his eyes growing wide as he held the liquid in his mouth. Then he took another, closing his eyes in pleasure. If he were a cat, she thought, he would be purring.
She took a sip. And understood. She was drinking liquid rubies.
But they did not discuss the wine. When she remarked on it later, Jules shrugged. "What would we say? The wine spoke for itself. We were drinking time, drinking history, tasting the past. You can't talk about that, and only idiots would try."
Instead, they cooked.
Stella goes from being someone who doesn't even think of food to someone who is brave and loves the experience of trying new things, some of which are probably outside the realms of what I would like to try myself. It turns out that, of course, she has an exceptional palette and food begins to becomes a huge part of her future.
This is a bit of a kitchen sink book. If you think about any of the things that France is famous for it is in the book. Food and wine...check. Art...check. Literature...check. Iconic locations...check.
So what stopped this from being a more enjoyable experience to me. It comes down to one chapter early in the book. In chapter 2 of the book, we hear about some childhood experiences that Stella had, and having read to the end, I am not sure why it needed to be there. Whilst I think it was meant to show that those experiences shaped the way that she lived her life in New York, just her difficult relationship with her mother would have been enough to explain it. It felt a bit manipulative to me, although I do acknowledge that this particular subject is something that I am a bit sensitive too.
So this was a bit of a mixed bag of a read for me. I enjoyed a lot of the book, but it was soured a little by some of the choices that the author made.
I am sharing this review with Paris in July, with Weekend Cooking which I host, Bookish Books Reading Challenge hosted at Bloggin' 'Bout Books, with the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge which I host and with Foodies Read hosted at Based on a True Story. This is the eighth book I have read this year with the word Paris in the title!
Rating 3.5/5
