A Town Like Paris: Falling in Love in the City of Light
by Bryce Corbett
This book is a memoir. It is not a travel guide. One must read the book as a memoir or even a journal of the author's experiences on first moving to Paris and the changes he experienced in his life during the first few years in Paris. The book offers an insight into the lifestyle of the author as a young man. The author describes various incidents in his life in Paris, and also his thoughts about his life there. Many people would not find his lifestyle very attractive, as I myself did not. In addition, I also did not find his thoughts about his life to be attractive.
Oddly, to me, I find Australians to be the happiest people I have come across, but I found this Australian's comments about people in particular, to be snide, mean and very unattractive. He made the same snide, mean comments about himself, so he may have intended his comments in humor, but they were still very unattractive, and they greatly detracted from the enjoyment of the book.
The first part of the book is more about the author's observations on life in Paris; the second part of the book is more about his falling in love with an Australian dancer at the Lido. In the first part of the book, he describes Paris and Parisians; in the second part of the book, he describes his own inanity in falling in love.
I have two very different, even opposite, reactions to this book. On the one hand, I feel sad and upset about all of his negativity; on the other, I feel good about reading the book and do feel that it provides insights into the culture and mindset of Parisians. I found the first part of the book very enjoyable; I didn't care for the second part of the book very much at all. Why would a beautiful woman fall in love with him? Perhaps in real life, he is more attractive than he described himself in the book.
For more information about the author and the book, he has a blog, and a short video here.
