This second novel of Johnson's which I have read traces the adventures of Isabel Walker, an attractive young film school drop out who travels to France to help her sister during her second pregnancy. During the course of her stay in France her sister's husband engages in a romantic liason with a married woman and leaves her. As their divorce procedes Isabel finds herself becomming the mistress to her sisters Uncle in law. Though the lives of these women sound lke a soap opera Johnson blends this into a realistic adventure. The work is yet another interesting exploration of an american abroad while still developing characters and advancing an entertaining plot.
There are many similarities between this novel and the first Johnson work I read, Persian nights. In both an american female whose personal life is in some disarray finds herself in a foreign land rapidly in the midst of new sexual realtionships while the backdrop of her new cultural setting allows Johnson to comment on being american and saying something about the foreign culture that the protagonist is found in.

I enjoyed it for the Parisian flavor and complex characters, but I could have done well without the disgusting affair details btwn Isabel and her Septuagenarian lover (which doesn't jive with the rest of her tone throughout the rest of the book,) and the slightly overly-dramatic elements. It would have been more suited to be a "lighter read." By toying with more traumatic/grotesque elements, it kind of became one of those books you keep reading HOPING it will get better and make up for its random dramatic transgressions. Does it pick up? Yes. But mainly the setting of the story is what saves this read.

I had to stop reading this book because it was sooooo bad! I have never done this before.

Being an American woman who has felt the sweet pain of an unrequited love affair with Paris, I found this book utterly delightful. I could relate to the authors struggle with the language, cultural differences and her infatuation with all things French, from the wine to the food to the French love of discord.
The plot involves (the protagonist) Izabelles sister, Roxy, a poet who has left her American family in Santa Barbara CA to make her life in Paris, married to a French painter whose family is connected and well heeled. The painter has left a very pregnant Roxy and their young daughter to run off with a married woman. Enter Izabelle, a woman in her early 20's who has not yet settled on a path for her life. Her role is to help Roxy navigate the last trimesters of pregnancy, the emotionally wrought landscape of marriage/separation/divorce and to babysit.
Izabelle picks up a handful of odd jobs, introduces a host of interesting and well drawn characters, her employers, her lovers and the family Roxy inherited through her marriage. She takes us to concerts, dinners, through the streets of Paris and in a series of unexpected plot twists to a conclusion that begs for another book!

This was really very poorly written. All you really need to know is that there is an unresolved and very boring subplot involving a soup tureen. Paris has inspired many books. Pick another one. Nothing to see here.

Oo la-la. Silly Americans in an even sillier Old World. France is still the place where you can pretend that you are better than everyone else on the planet! And here I thought Argentinians on vacay where a pain in the ass. Manners & style are evidently as relevant today as ever.

I love a good comedy of manners and Diane Johnson is the best we have in this genre at the moment. This is part of a trilogy (the other volumes are Le Mariage and L'Affaire) that pits upper-middle class Americans against their French counterparts. Smart, witty and beautifully observed and written. I will read anything she writes.

I needed a light book so grabbed this off my bookshelf - and then was pleasantly surprised to find it had a lot of substance. It has some implausible plot twists but I thoroughly enjoyed the cultural commentary (yes, French adults do throw bread at the dinner table) and the characters were interesting. I highly recommend this as vacation reading.

I loved this book; I thought it was great mindless fiction. I enjoyed the peep-show view of living in France through her eyes. The whole Eiffel Tower drama was a bit silly, but what the heck?


Oh, and whatever you do...DON'T WATCH THE MOVIE. Ugh, ralph and horridness.

Picked it up because the author was born in Moline, IL and the book was a National Book Award Finalist. I found it tedious; the lack of something to read on my train ride is the only reason I made it to the end. I didn't care about any of the characters enough to want to know how it ended.

Why did I read this steaming turd of a book?

I bought this book on my honeymoon in Paris, funnily enough. Still married!

I found this book to be pretentious and shallow. Parts of it were beautifully written, but the plot meandered all over the place and nothing was resolved at the end. All the characters were selfish and unlikable and their motivations were not clear to me.