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Saturday, December 05, 2009
butchered
Ti: Cleaving
Au: Julie Powell
Bookmark - ARC edition, dog-eared it.
HC published: 12/01/09
I was excited to be offered an ARC of Julie Powell's new book. Plenty of people liked 'Julie and Julia,' including me, even if Julia didn't. It might have turned out to be telling that while 'Julie and Julia' was made into a pretty decent movie, I enjoyed the scenes with Julia more than those that focused on Julie.
Unfortunately, the part of this book that interested me most was the butchering, as the author takes on an apprenticeship after searching high and low for a traditional butcher shop that's willing to take a student. Being as this is a memoir, Powell writes quite a bit about what's going on in her life during this time. Maybe I'm judge-y, maybe I'm naive, but the airing of her not-so-secret and intense affair turned me off - especially since her husband didn't really have much of a choice in the decision to have it aired, I would imagine. On the other hand, I have to admire her balls for putting it all out there.
I do like Powell's writing and enjoyed finishing the whole book for that aspect, but also found that the book was oddly paced and ended kinda abruptly. I suppose that since it's a memoir, you sorta have to write your life at the pace and in the order that it happened and the abruptness could be one of the better ways to express what she goes through.
I suppose it might be most accurate to say that I don't like the author, rather than I don't like the book. There's certainly authenticity in her struggles and foibles, and I'm sure that many people can see things they've thought or felt expressed pretty eloquently, but it just doesn't make her a hero. I don't think she's trying to be one though, so in that way, the book probably hit the mark.Labels: infidelity, likely-future-freebie, meat, memoir, mid-life crisis, travel
posted by ~e at
1:42 AM
2 Comments:
Haven't read the book, but I can completely understand why you didn't like the "affair" aspect. Personally, I'm tired of being bludgeoned over the head each day with the latest salacious story about marital infidelity. I don't really understand why it has to be a national discussion, and I'm really not all that interested.
12/06/2009 10:24 PM
Yeah, what is it with all these affairs? Now I know to avoid that book, even though I enjoyed Julie & Julia.
12/07/2009 4:56 PM
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