I could not endure this insufferable narrator any longer! Could she possibly whine even more?! As a die-hard fan of the movie, I had extremely high hopes for the book. Generally speaking, the book is often better than the movie. However, I am deeply disappointed to say that this is not the case with this particular book. I couldn't even make it through 100 pages. Powell comes across as a whiny writer who overuses metaphors and similes to an excessive extent. It's a definite DNF (Did Not Finish) for me.

I found myself constantly frustrated with the narrator's constant whining and the lack of engaging storytelling. The excessive use of literary devices felt forced and detracted from the overall reading experience. I had expected so much more from this book, especially considering my love for the movie. But unfortunately, it failed to live up to my expectations.

I will likely not be picking up any more books by this author in the future. It's a shame because I had such high hopes, but sometimes reality just doesn't match our expectations.

This is purely to be read as my feelings on the book, not as a recommendation to anyone. I know that my issues with it are very personal to me and the way I viewed the author/narrator, and I don't expect someone else to see it the same way.

I have to start by saying that I think the idea behind this book is one of the best I've ever heard. I really wish I had thought of it myself (although I know it would have been completely impossible for me to accomplish with all the wine involved). I admired Julie's need to do something more with her life. I respected and identified with her choice to stage an extravagant cooking project to help her get out of her rut. I was jealous that it turned into a much bigger opportunity for her. I thought the struggles to make classic French food in a tiny kitchen would be amusing and that I'd understand her attempts to make something magnificent in less than ideal circumstances. In short, I was prepared to love this book.

However, I did not.

First of all, from the beginning of the book, I got no impression that Julie had any interest in food or any skill in the kitchen. Later on, when she describes herself as a foodie, I almost laughed out loud because it came as such a surprise to me. I really thought the Project just seemed like something interesting to do, not because she loved to cook. Later on, she explains how she got into cooking, but I still never felt like she really loved anything she ate or the process of making it. And, frankly, I think that either has to come from a lack of a true love for food and cooking, or her inability to write well about it. I suspect a combination of the two. Throughout the book, she describes all of her disasters in great detail, and it's very entertaining. But when it comes to describing any successful cooking process and her happy feelings about food, she glosses over them or writes in such a dry manner that it does nothing to inspire. It is merely a list of what she did to achieve the end result. The only time she tries to wax poetical about food is to compare it to sex. How unbelievably original! No one has ever done that before! Ugh. It also made me laugh that she compares herself to Nigella Lawson in their love of life and food, mainly because Nigella is so skilled in her food writing and takes such obvious joy in food and cooking that I can read her cookbooks like novels. Her ability to describe the pure happiness that food gives her is what sets her apart from any other cookbook writer I've read. Julie couldn't dream of writing like that on her best days. I'm not saying that Julie should have been able (or wanted to) recreate that kind of writing, but her comparison was the funniest part of the book.

It also frustrated me to no end that she complained about her many disasters when she went about her cooking in such a stupid way. Of course things won't turn out if you skip over steps, don't read recipes ahead of time, and substitute crucial ingredients. In the meantime, her kitchen is constantly trashed (to the point of maggots growing on her counter) and she moves in the middle of the Project. Why why why??? Why make it seem as though the recipes are so difficult when you are the one making them that way??? What's the point of a huge life-changing project if you are only going to make it unnecessarily difficult for yourself? Was she trying to make a better story by using no preparation for the task? I guess this comes down to the main question I had with the book: was she just doing something for the sake of writing about it, or did she really want to learn how to cook French food? She views herself as a modern Julia Child, someone without direction in her life and starts something that seems crazy to find it. I can see how she'd perceive it that way, but when she's upset at the end of the book to find out that Julia disapproved of her Project, I completely sided with Julia. To have your life's work reduced into almost a joke would be a hard thing to see, especially since Julie seemed to have more interest in checking off each recipe on her list rather than actually doing them well.

I don't want to criticize Julie's image of Julia Child - she's entitled to see her any way she wants, but I found myself feeling more and more at odds with her in basically every way. I hesitate to write my issues with her as a person, but the book is clearly attempting to make her into a sympathetic, relatable character so I feel like it's fair. Maybe other people could relate to her in some way, but her constant swearing and her perhaps more constant drinking nearly alienated me completely. Whatever, we have different standards of living. But as I read, I really struggled to see how there was anything to like about her. She dismissal of her friends' affairs with married men (or cheating on their own spouses) really bothered me, but then she also complains about the fact that she's completely happy in her own marriage and she wishes some stranger would send her dirty IMs. What?! And she never comes to any conclusions on these things - that it can be hard to be married when all your friends are single and can't relate, but that she's ultimately happier this way. The only purpose for including these stories about her friends and her own philosophies is to try to somehow inanely relate it to the processes of whatever she's currently cooking, but the connections are non-existent at best. I had to re-read sentences so many times to try to understand how she could see the comparison she was attempting to make. And the complaining! She complains about everything! - her job, her marriage, the Project, her friends, her apartment, etc. If she had this intense sense of "joy" that she shares with Julia and Nigella, why was absolutely everything in her life worthy of complaint? This is perhaps the most self-indulgent books I've ever read, and unfortunately all her blog readers contribute to her over-inflated sense of self-pity. I can definitely understand and appreciate a lot of existential angst, but I failed to see anything that made me like her in any way. Even as a liberal psuedo-hipster myself, she reminded me of the kind of hipster I can't stand: aggressive, mean, arrogant, Republican-bashing, and full of self-aggrandizement.

P.S. I have to add that her inability to tell a narrative without having to insert myriad tangents that she should have expressed to set up the story in the first place was completely annoying. This is a book pretending to be a memoir of self-discovery, but it's really just obnoxious chick lit. Two stars for the idea only.

I think there is an unfortunate trend that people, especially women, are following these days. They verbally criticize themselves in a hyper self-aware way. It's as if listing all their faults, whether real or imagined, will not only amuse the listener but also prove that they are stoic and even good-humored about being the biggest, fattest, ugliest, and most batty failures on earth.

"Doesn't he get it? Doesn't he understand that if I don't finish the whole book in a year, then this whole thing will be a waste? That I'll spiral into mediocrity and despair and probably end up on the street trading blow jobs for crack or something? He hates me anyway. Look at him, curled up on his side of the bed as if he doesn't want to touch me. It's because I have the stink of failure on me. I'm doomed..."

Now, I like a bit of self-deprecation from time to time. But this book is entirely based on the author's insecurities, which are mostly unfounded. The foundation of this book is at least shaky. This is clearly a bright woman, and obviously very few people think they are the most abhorrent human being alive, or the mortality rate in our society would skyrocket. So why bother with all this abuse? She doesn't need it. Her prose is clever and deliberate, and all this "I hate myself" nonsense really obscures what she is trying to say.

Perhaps it's because she based this book on her blog, which really lends itself to this kind of meta-humor. But I'm soooo sick of it. Go read about fistula in Africa and then tell me how depressed you are because you're making your own life miserable. Bah!

I would give this 2.5 stars if I could give half stars.

The sections that deal with cooking and food are truly interesting and enjoyable. They offer a vivid and engaging look into the world of cuisine, making the reader's mouth water.

However, the parts about her life are just plain boring and a real struggle to get through. It feels like a chore rather than a pleasure to read those segments.

For one of the very few times in my life, I have to say that I actually liked the movie adaptation better than the book. The movie managed to capture the essence of the cooking and food aspects while also presenting a more engaging and entertaining story overall.

Perhaps if the author had focused more on the cooking and less on the mundane details of her life, the book would have been a much better read. As it stands, it's a bit of a disappointment.

I purchased Julie Powell's Julie and Julia after watching - and adoring - the film version.

From the very beginning, the book is filled with warmth and amusement, and I truly relished every moment of reading it.

As one might anticipate, the book is much more focused on Powell and her arduous journey through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking rather than on Child herself, which is different from the film version.

There is a great deal of depth within these pages. Powell not only details her culinary adventures but also delves into her personal life, including her marriage and her work in a government agency handling the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks on New York City.

Powell writes with a confident and assertive voice, vividly demonstrating the significance of challenging oneself and using a structured project like this to accomplish something that initially appears nearly insurmountable.

In conclusion, Julie and Julia is an absolute gem that is well worth taking the time to read.

As a die-hard fan of this movie, I was over the moon when I discovered a copy of the memoir at the Book Depot. Holy cow! I'm truly glad they toned down Julie's annoyance factor for the movie. And I firmly believe that having the dual-story presentation of Julia Child simultaneously really salvaged the narrative.

Barely anything was altered from the memoir to the movie, so I must confess that I'm a huge enthusiast of the overall concept. Being a blogger myself since around the age of 13, I greatly admire Julie (and her husband Eric) for devising such a brilliant idea as the Julie/Julia Project. This sort of creativity and challenge intrigues me to no end, and I think social media has somewhat spoiled it. Obviously, I wasn't a fully aware human in 2001, but any account of the world's relationship with the Internet makes me grin. Life online seemed so much less complicated back then.

Let's get back to the story! I found Julie Powell's writing to be average, but I'm awarding this 4 stars due to the phenomenal concept and the fact that I can't separate my love for the film from this review.

Here's a crazy coincidence that I don't know if anyone else noticed.... Both Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci are mentioned in the memoir!! And they portray Julia and Paul Child in the movie!!! That made me shriek with joy. Life can be really cool at times.

This was a fun and quick read, and I highly recommend it to lovers of the film! If you haven't watched Julie and Julia, I strongly suggest you read this book and then watch the movie!!! It will truly amaze you.

As a food maniac, I had extremely high hopes for this book. The theme was truly intriguing: 365 days and 524 recipes. However, I had always been hesitant because of the mixed reviews it received. But when the opportunity arose to pick up this book at a 50% discount recently, I finally agreed to buy it.

The book was highly touted as the original food blog. Vogue said, "Restore[s] your faith in eating for pleasure." The Times also praised it, saying, "I savoured each [dish] with the same delight as the author." But to my disappointment, this book is not really about food or the love of cooking. Instead, it's about the rather boring life of a bored secretary named Julie Powell.

She didn't even have a genuine love for food. She took up this project simply because she was bored with her job, her life, and her apartment. Prior to the project, she didn't eat eggs and was squeamish about bone marrow. It's a rather disappointing introduction for someone who claims to be a foodie. After all, a person can only be labelled a food-lover (and produce a book about cooking) if they keep an open mind, right?

As I read through her yet another clumsy attempt at cooking, I was truly disappointed and even contemplated stopping right there. The writing is messy (which might be appropriate for a blog as there were too many distractions from cooking about her unexciting life). The heroine is whiny (why must she throw a tantrum every time a dish fails and aggravate her poor husband? After all, the project was her idea). The recipes are uninspiring (every dish, from appetizer to dessert, requires at least 1 stick of butter. I begin to lose faith in this Julia Child lady). Then I realized that instead of reading it as a culinary book, I should read it as a chick-lit. And it worked to some extent: the book suddenly became a fraction more enjoyable. But still, there was more whining than food, and I had expected the opposite when I bought it.

In the end, she said Julia Child changed her life. I'm not sure in what regard. Sure, she gained a lot of weight from all that butter and had 15-minutes of fame from attempting to cook French food in an American kitchen. But personally, I'm not sure if the project really made her happy. She screamed obscenities throughout and didn't seem to care about learning from experience: she kept on making mayonnaise by machine despite failing numerous times and always had to repeat the process by hand every time. What an irritating waste of food.

The book is probably best left as a blog. But if you're a true foodie, I would recommend going and reading Chubby Hubby instead. It's free and might offer a more satisfying culinary experience.

I absolutely adored this book!!!! It truly made me reflect back on my senior year.

Specifically, it reminded me of my class with Ava and the fascinating concept of the “unlikeable woman” narrator. At first, I was rather hesitant about her.

However, as I delved deeper into the story, something magical happened. By the end, I found myself completely in love with her.

Maybe it’s because I’m a bit of a sap, but there was just something about her journey and the way she developed that really tugged at my heartstrings.

This book not only entertained me but also made me think about the different types of characters we encounter in literature and how our perceptions of them can change over time.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a thought-provoking and engaging read.

I read this book for my book club.

It tells the story of a woman who is stuck in a lousy job and generally feeling disillusioned. Then, she gets the idea to take on the challenge of cooking all 524 recipes in a Julia Childs cookbook within one year. She and her husband live in a small and rather shabby apartment. These recipes are no joke, with some very unusual ingredients. So, of course, the project sometimes descends into chaos.

It's clear that the events in the book really happened to the author, and it reads more like a journal or blog than a traditional "story." There's no main problem, no build-up to a climax, and no real resolution. So, it was a book that I didn't have a problem reading, but I also had no issue putting it down when I needed to, and there was no urgent desire to read it in a frenzy to reach the end (which is my usual way).

Unsurprisingly, this book reinforced what I already knew to be true. I don't really like to cook, especially not anything fancy. I can't fathom why anyone would go through all that trouble (and use so much butter) to cook something that will be devoured in 15 minutes, leaving only a mountain of dirty dishes behind!

I didn't feel particularly attached to any of the characters, including Julie. Maybe it's because I didn't feel like I went through any real crisis with her. Her difficulties in finding rare ingredients or struggling to cut the lobster just didn't stir my emotions. Perhaps I would have related more to her if her "project" was rescuing countless stray dogs or something else. I guess cooking just didn't resonate with me.

However, to not sound completely negative (no food pun intended!), I did find the descriptions of the cooking techniques interesting from a knowledge perspective. Since I don't cook at that level and probably never will, I did appreciate being exposed to the terminology and such. I also understand the woman's need to validate herself, and I applaud her efforts.

Okay, full disclosure: What happened to Julie Powell is a fantasy I didn't even know I could have. I have a passion for both writing and cooking. In fact, I once went to the trouble of compiling not just one, but two cookbooks filled with my favorite recipes.

These cookbooks, while not original in content, were complete with blog-like anecdotes related to each recipe. I then distributed them among my family and friends. So, in a way, I'm similar to Julie Powell in that at that time, I didn't have much of a life and turned to cooking and writing for stimulation.

However, it never crossed my mind that I could do the following: a) Dedicate an entire year to cooking through a classic cookbook! b) Blog about it and actually have interested people reading my blog! c) Have that blog not only turn into a book deal but also a movie deal! That's Julie Powell's reality, while my fantasy (or rather, lack thereof) pales in comparison.

The more modest fantasy that I did consciously have was that "Julie & Julia" would provide me with a plethora of free Julia Child recipes without my having to obtain Child's book. I'll admit it, I'm a bit of a cheapskate. But, as I should have predicted given copyright laws and our litigious society, that didn't pan out.

Nonetheless, I thought it was reasonable to expect that I'd hear more about the actual cooking than I did.

Is this a criticism of the book? I'm not entirely sure. I did enjoy Julie's writing and humor, and for the most part, I found her book highly readable, even when cooking wasn't the main focus (which was often).

However, I think I might have preferred this as a blog read in installments rather than a continuous book. It suffers from many of the typical flaws that occur when a blog is converted into a book, namely a lack of overall focus, a sense of repetitiveness, and excessive length.

It's not that the number of pages was overly high, but rather that the book dragged on for far too long considering its content. I only have so much patience for reading what is essentially someone's rambling diary, as opposed to a novel with a captivating plot and well-developed characters or a non-fiction work that actually teaches me something.

Even traditional memoirs that didn't start out as blogs usually have a more distinct narrative arc than "Julie & Julia" did.

That being said, this book was largely an enjoyable read. And unlike many other Goodreads reviewers, I'm not complaining about wishing I could get my time back. Thanks to all the reviews I read on Goodreads, I didn't go into it with overly high expectations, and as a result, I was able to simply enjoy the book for what it was.

Incidentally, I did learn from the more detailed cooking anecdotes that "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" is one cookbook I will probably never purchase, despite my serious cookbook addiction. From what I could gather, the recipes seem fussy, expensive, and not at all suitable for kids, not to mention difficult or even impossible to adapt to a kosher lifestyle.

In light of my new mindset on cooking and blogging, I firmly decided that the time had ultimately arrived to read "Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen" by Julie Powell. Interestingly, due to the upcoming movie release, the subtitle has been needlessly altered to "My Year of Cooking Dangerously". Julie, a woman dissatisfied with her job as a secretary and facing her rapidly approaching 30th birthday, made a bold decision. She resolved to spend an entire year cooking every single recipe in Julia Child's epic book, "Mastering the Art of French Cooking", while blogging about her experience along the way. Her husband, although a bit cautious, gamely accepted that this was something she simply had to do, and thus the Julie/Julia project was born.

The book vividly chronicles her (mis)adventures and remarkable triumphs as she progresses from preparing vegetable dishes to handling parts of the animals that even made me, a girl who has voluntarily eaten worms and bugs before, feel a twinge of squeamishness. I found myself frequently laughing out loud and truly relating to Julie. Not only did we share a mutual and semi-fanatical love for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but also her descriptions of the different ways she and her friend coped with stress - drinking and cooking versus running and cleaning - really struck a chord with me.

Overall, this was an extremely enjoyable read. It was truly heartening to hear about someone who was able to initiate a project like hers and have it unintentionally transform into such an amazing opportunity. I firmly believe it gives us hope that satisfaction in life can often emerge from the most unexpected endeavors.

I’ve never heard about either Julie or Julia before I saw the movie “Julie/Julia”.

Since then, it has become a favorite movie of mine, and I’ve watched it a whopping 20 times.

Intrigued by the story, I decided to get both Julia Child’s memories of her year in France and Julie Powell’s book.

I started with Julie’s book first, perhaps in March 2012.

I finally finished it yesterday evening.

In between, I’ve read numerous other books, including Julia Child’s own memoir, and seen the movie several more times.

The book isn’t bad. In fact, it’s quite funny.

However, for some reason, there is just too much happening on one page.

It jumps from one situation to the next, and there are too many words in one sentence, which made me feel dizzy.

I kept losing my concentration and almost gave up several times.

I didn’t have the feeling that I was fully immersed in the pages.

In my mind, I kept comparing it to the movie, which was a really good adaptation by the way.

The description of the accumulating sticky dirt and cat hair while trying to cook around it didn’t make things any better.

There is also the matter of the ending.

The words “The End” appeared so many times in the last pages that I wanted to scream out loud.

I know it was supposed to be funny or bubbly, like the spirit of the book in general, but it just got really annoying.

I kept comparing it to the ending of the movie, where Julie gathers her friends and hosts a rooftop dinner. That was a proper project closure.

I didn’t find such a defined closure in the book, and the repetitive “The End” just blurred the closure even more for me.

But then again, in real life, there is no such thing as a perfect closure, is there?

I guess this is one of those situations where a movie has ruined the book experience for me, which is definitely a first in my life.

Julie Powell’s book, however, is still going on my bookshelf, and I would recommend it if you’re interested.

After all, it’s not every day that a fellow blogger turns their experience into a book deal and a movie adaptation!