I bought this book for my husband last year. He's read it and thought it was OK, but nothing special. I've just started it and from the first chapter or so think I will enjoy it very much. But then again I am an inveterate Francophile, have spent the last 4 years learning about French language and culture and, like the author, have made a transatlantic journey to a new life when my youngest child was 8 months old. Just some of the reasons I think I'll enjoy it!

From the back:
In 1995, Adam Gopnik, his wife and their infant son left the familiar comforts and hassles of New York City for the urbane glamour of Paris. In the grand tradition of Stein, Hemingway, Baldwin, and Liebling, Gopnik set out to enjoy the storied existence of an American in Paris - walks down the paths of the Tuileries, philosophical discussions in cafés, and afternoon jaunts to the Musée d'Orsay.
But as readers of Gopnik's beloved and award-winning "Paris Journal" in The New Yorker know, there was also the matter of raising a child and carrying on with la vie quotidienne - the daily, slightly less fabled life. As Gopnik discovers in this funny and tender account, the dual processes of navigating a foreign city and becoming a parent are not completely dissimilar - both promise new routines, new languages, and a new set of rules by which each day is to be lived. With singular wit and insight, Gopnik manages to weave the magical with the mundane in this wholly delightful book...

Finished reading it today! I really enjoyed it - there was so much insight in it, both about French culture and American, with no real bias one way or the other. Interesting reading it as neither French nor American, but with the common experience of being a temporary expatriate, as I recognised many of the feelings the author talked about. Gopnik's descriptions of his Parisian surroundings are beautifully poetic too. I wanted to be there, drinking champagne and eating tarte au citron and taking my children to ride on the carousel at the Jardin du Luxembourg.

I don't want to release this one for ever, but am keen to share it with as many people as possible, so I've decided to send this out as a bookring. So far we have the following people interested (in tentative order)

1. yvonnep (Netherlands) *
2. boucli (France)
3. Maria-Nunes (Portugal)
4. beckys (Italy)
5. Annelis (Finland) *
6. buchsuch (Germany) *
7. curlita (USA - WA)
8. Scramble (USA - IL) - skipped
9. baaic (USA - IA) <-------------- current reader
10. kristamd (USA - MD)
11. Kymberlie (USA - TX)
12. MandMsMom (USA - CT)
13. nillabreen (USA - MA) *
14. mariananewlands (Brazil)
15. Tuz (Brazil) *
16. jossanaijr (Brazil) *
17. back to Kernow8 (UK)


* = international shipping OK

The bookring has started! Mailed to yvonnep...

Paris to the Moon just arrived...The weather is fine, sun is shining, so I'm going to read in the garden... thank you, Kernow8!

I was very pleased to be the first of the bookring. I have to admit that finishing the book was rather difficult. After about 200 pages I've had it... Actually, the book is about an American in Paris who loves Paris very much. I skipped chapters with to much soccer and American football (or whatever the name is). Gopnik stays at the surface of Paris and that's a pity. Lots of things in the book I did't recognize (may be because I'm European too and that I am, because of my semi-French lover, used to it) and there were things I definitely missed. F.e. if you buy Le Monde in Paris late Friday afternoon, they'll ask you whether you want the Friday edition or the Saturday-edition!!! He doesn't seem to watch French television - he could have noticed the 'weather-man' on France 2 who really makes a show out of the weather-forecast instead of the CNN way of doing it, which he does mention. He likes French cooking and doesn't mention the wonderful cooking magazines (Cuisiner! Cuisine Actuelle) that every kiosque sells.
But I don't want to discourage my fellow-readers: there are nice chapters. I laughed out loudly at his story about the Christmas guirlandes. Same in Holland and I thank the French lady in the book for the trick! No guirlandes-fights next Christmas.
Now the book will be send to France, Toulouse and Boucli can check whether I'm right or wrong, caused by a too romantic feeling about Paris, France and the French.

This little book arrived yesterday, together with Kernow8 and Yvonnep postcards, and a wooden bookmark about the chinese year of the monkey...

And guess what : This book WILL go to Paris !!!
I'll be there next week...I'll try to take a picture of the book there, and will anyway add another parisian postcard !

picture : book in front of Notre Dame de Paris

As to the moon, somebody else will have to take it there...

Un américain à Paris !!!
Thanks, kernow8, for giving me the opportunity to read this book !...
I must admit that his Paris is not really the one I know, except for a few things, and I agree with a lot of Yvonnep commentaries...
Yet, I enjoyed reading it, and found the way he talks about strikes in France (the big 1995 strikes, or their fight for "the Balzar"), for example, very convincing !
One thing I didn't like was the way he said "this (or that) in France is always like that" because he saw it once...
For example :
- I can't remember ever having a Christmas tree with these "ringed" guirlandes he talks about...mine were always "stranded"...but I never bought any in Paris ;-))
- Not ALL french fridges have the freezer part at the bottom... some have, but they are much more expensive than the ones with the freezer part on top...
- When you're pregnant, you have to have a blood test to determine if you have "toxoplasmose" antibodies (which would mean that you already got the disease)...If, and only if, you don't, you can't eat raw vegetables...
- When you're pregnant, more and more french gynecologists advise you NOT to drink any alcohol, be it red wine or Champagne...

But then again, it's about an American life in Paris, it's not about my life there !

AND....this book went to Paris, so I've donwloaded a few pictures of it "in location", and will send the pictures and a few other postcards along with the book, so that it goes back to kernow8 (sorry, Yvonnep, you won't see all of it...)...

Picture : book in front of the "musée d'Orsay"

Update 9/29/03 : book on its way to Portugal

I've got it with me. I've already started reading... I love Paris, where I've been (for the first time) one year ago. I spent three weeks there and I really loved it!
Hope I'll love reading this book, too.

This book has just arrived in my mail box: thank you! It looks wonderful, full of nice pictures and photos... I hope you'll be patient: my house's full of bookrings at the moment!

This book has been "sleeping" here for too long... I've begun reading it, but it's not like I expected. I think that the best thing to do is sending it on to Annelis, who's already given me her address.
I'm very sorry, but this is a very busy period of my life and I can't read as much as I'd love to.

The book arrived yesterday. I just finished two other book ring books so I can begin this right away.
I have been in Paris thrice and it is nice to read about the experiences of others.
Thank you!

It took some time to get into this. At first I had it as my bed-time reading, but I fell asleep too soon. Now I am reading it while commuting to work and back and I am hoping the train would go slower. The book is really interesting once you get into it. I am half way through already. I think Gopnik writes well even if I don't always share his opinions.
This is my favourite picture from my visit to Paris in December 2001. It looks like Tour Eiffel isn't ready yet. It was rather warm for December but I think the man we saw jogging in shorts through the streets was exaggerating the warmth!

This book is nice reading in a quiet sort of way. It is not exciting or demanding fast reading. It is like someone thinking by himself. Kind of thoughts I could think if left alone.
The part about the differences between the American football and that of ours did not interest me personally but I read it anyway.
He was wondering about the long motherhood leave in France but ours is more than twice so long. Last time, she is now 14, I had 1 month before and 10 or 11 months afterwards and if I remember right the first 4 months were at full pay and the rest at 70-80 %. Most part of the money is paid by the state I think. I don't remember so well because it was so long ago and the things are changing all the time. And besides I took after that a leave without pay until my baby was 3 yrs getting some small money from the state. That was with the right to return to my job which I did. After my first two babies I returned to my job when they were about 12 months. But the last time I wanted to enjoy my baby as long as I could as our economical situation was better.
After the baby is 3 months old the leave can be taken by the father instead of the mother. My male colleague was taking care of his third baby (and the two others as well) for a year so his wife could return to her work after giving birth to three babies two years between them. Not very many men use this right, though.

About nobody wanting to read papers in the steambath. Every now and then I find well steamed magazines in our sauna. My husband and eldest daughter love sauna very much and they often read there. Books are too valuable to be steamed but magazines are thrown away afterwards anyway.

The writer had early memories from Paris. I wonder what memories Luke will have. Will he also be going back to Paris when he is grown up. Certainly for visits, but for living there for a longer period...?

The book is leaving today for Germany - Buchsuch is waiting for it. Happy reading, Buchsuch!

Thanks, the book arrived today! Nice collection of postcards inside :) Good idea, but this makes the shipping more expensive because you (me, in Germany) can't send it as "book" (cheaper) when it has other stuff inside... They probably don't check very often, but I won't risk it.

Anyway, I looking forward to reading it soon!

Good book! I always like to read books about a country, written by a foreigner living in that country. They have a different point of view, and often they are able to shows as things we don't really see anymore or which we take for granted, because they are part of our daily life. For instance I liked that chapter on football very much, the comparison to life in general.
Today, the book is continuing its journey to curlita - enjoy!

What a great book! It was a pleasant surprise to get this in the mail, as I had forgotten I'd signed up for the book ring. My favorite chapters were the one about the World Cup, the Rookie, and swimming at the Ritz with Cressida and Ada. I liked the author's voice and his sense of self-deprecation as an American living in Paris and struggling with the language and the cultural differences - his awareness of the awkwardness of his French when emotional, for example, or his unwillingness for the French ladies at the Ritz to see his feet waggling. There were some passages in the book that made me laugh out loud.

My first visit to Paris was a year ago and I would love to go back. It would be interesting to read an American's take of living in France for 5 years now, post 9/11. I think it would be more difficult because of the ideological conflict between our two governments, but perhaps I am wrong.

In any case, I enjoyed this read immensely. Thanks, Kernow8, for bringing it my way!

Received in early March. Next on my TBR

Wow. This had been recommended to me by the "Hypatia" recommender at www.alexlit.com, and it was actually worth it. There are several times when Gopnik seems to get caught up in the French mania for abstraction, especially in the introductory chapter.

But there are so many memorable stories within. His horror at infecting the continent with Barney the Dinosaur, the quest for a birthing facility where the anaesthesiologists are least likely to strike, and the encounter with the Regiment Rouge are all sections of the book that I was able to share with my wife, which is a rare thing.

I do feel like I know Paris a little better now, even if this document is now five years old, and some stories within are now at least 10 years old. It certainly adds some background to the huffiness displayed by Chirac after the recent decision over the 2012 Olympics.