Oh my gosh folks, it’s yet another memoir about living in Paris! So this book continues my recent track record of reading as many memoirs about living in Paris as humanly possible. As my move gets closer and closer, I’m getting more excited and nervous to be leaving the East Coast behind and launching on my next adventure. I was really excited to read this memoir because it is much more recent than most of the ones I’ve read so far. Gopnik lived in Paris in the 1990s and into the early 2000s and chronicled his experiences in the Paris Journals for the New Yorker as well as within this memoir. Gopnik explores the difficulties of being an American in Paris as well as becoming a new father shortly before his move across continents.

I really loved this book. Gopnik is pensive and truthful and uproariously funny even under difficult circumstances. Gopnik details the minutiae of living in Paris and the daily battles of an American trying to adapt to a new home, specifically in a home so disdainful of the brand of American globalism that Mr. Gopnik represents. I found the reflections on his life to be touching and made me unafraid to move to Paris today. I think my favorite part of the book was the series of Christmas Journals, a reflection from the holiday season in Paris. Gopnik wrote a Christmas Journal for each year he was in Paris and it’s thought-provoking to read through his year end tabulation of the joys and disappointments of the outgoing year. I would absolutely recommend this book and I’m going to give this one to my mom when I return home for the summer. I hope you are able to find a copy, mine was courtesy of Thriftbooks so I suggest you start there! Happy Reading!