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Title: French Spirits : A House, a Village, and a Love Affair in Burgundy by Jeffrey Greene ISBN: 0-06-093410-7 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 01 March, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.77 (13 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A charming and spirited look at la belle France
Comment: I have read just about every book on restoring homes in France and Italy. (Non, I'm not a voyeur or dreamer.... I have done something similar in SW France & wanted to check out others' experiences.) In my view, Jeffrey Greene's poetic and self-revealing (without being self-centered) memoir of his experiences with his neighbors (as well as his family members) and his presbytery is simply the best of the genre. He treats his new acquaintances in the Burgundy village in the same way he approaches his building restoration: with delicacy and good will.
Greene's vignettes (e.g., one can SEE the car secured with boards and covers by the village square and the woman who leaves it there)add up to a loving portrait of a place and a time. Greene is a poetic observer who gives us, his readers, a feeling -- and understanding -- for his world. Thank you!!!
Rating: 2
Summary: Another Boomer Goes to France
Comment: I admit it: I'm a sucker for a travelogue in the style of Peter Mayle or even Francis Mayes: a bit self-indulgent, but entertaining. If I cannot live abroad myself, reading "A
Year in Provence" or "Under the Tuscan Sky" is the next best thing. My delight in finding a new author in the genre was quickly dashed however.
This book is a vanity piece.
Why, you ask? Here's an example: the author, Jeffrey Greene, spends two chapters discussing his wedding under a pear tree in the remote village of Rogney, deep in the heart of Burgundy. Why is that vain? Because he goes to great lengths to tell us about all the folks from back home who had to fly over, the musical celebrity guests that felt compelled to perform, and how the "simple back yard wedding" turned into several days of celebration including an extended in a nearby chateau for all the guests. And all of this because everyone was so happy for him. His bride through all this is a bit player, by the way, which is a good thing as I don't think Greene, and his ego could legally marry a third person. Perhaps the most gratuitous bit a fluff in a book so filled with fluff that it could fill a pillow, is the vows at the wedding itself: the various friends that officiate quote Greene's own poems along with the standard liturgy, and CS Lewis.
When Greene is not talking about himself, he talks about the village drunk/idiot. Given the choice, I would rather spend time with the drunk than with the author.
When you write this sort of book, you are supposed to be an observer, not the topic, and this is why this book fails: Greene goes to France, and tells us nothing about the experience, only about himself.
Rating: 1
Summary: I've been had!
Comment: Beware the spate of books on the topic of Americans/Brits living in France! Talk about publishers milking a trend! Unfortunately, not every author is a Peter Mayle or an Ann Barry. Greene's book, for example, is hopeless--- a shambles as far as organization goes, peopled by clueless, insensitive, and incompletely delineated characters (maybe that last is the good news, because the bad news is that this is a work of non-fiction.) It is about as illuminating of the French culture and countryside as a Greyhound bus tour of the Top Ten tourist sites of the Ile-de-France.
Don't be taken in by the book's title, as I was. Even we bibliophilic Francophiles have some standards!
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Title: From Here, You Can't See Paris : Seasons of a French Village and Its Restaurant by Michael S. Sanders ISBN: 0060184728 Publisher: HarperCollins Pub. Date: 05 November, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: The Olive Season: Amour, a New Life, and Olives Too by Carol Drinkwater ISBN: 1585672351 Publisher: Overlook Press Pub. Date: 15 May, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: A Castle in the Backyard: The Dream of a House in France by Betsy Draine, Michael Hinden ISBN: 0299179400 Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press Pub. Date: 16 September, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: A Farmhouse in Provence : An American finds old stones, new wine and love among the French by Mary Roblee Henry ISBN: 0595091652 Publisher: Author's Choice Press Pub. Date: 03 April, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love and Olive Oil in the South of France by Carol Drinkwater ISBN: 0142001309 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 25 June, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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