Julie & Julia

Terrible. The film is much better.

This was a good project in theory. It intrigued me that someone would dedicate an entire year to the task of cooking every single meal in a Julia Child cook book. Questions were raised when I first started the book: Did Julie survive the year? Did she resent her project eventually? Alas, I really couldn't get past her neurotic ways. I've also decided I don't really like reading about the process of cooking. I did, however, want to read more about Julia Child's history, but that desire could fulfilled reading some other book about Julia. I didn't finish this.

Did you know Julie Powell has had sex? She has!Have you ever heard of Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Julie Powell has!

This book has been on my TBR for five years, and a weeklong vacation was its ticket onto my currently-reading pile. I've seen the movie starring Meryl Streep and Amy Adams multiple times and love it–easily in my top list of movies which could be considered “chick flicks.” After considering it, I think there are two reasons it worked so well for me. The first is that the scenes of Julie Powell are paired with equal-length scenes of Julia Child, so it's both their stories and not just Julie's (in the book, 90% of the book is of course about Julie, with vignettes of Julia plopped down before each chapter). The second is that Julie Powell is played by charismatic Amy Adams.

The real Julie Powell isn't charismatic. She is whiny and pessimistic and self-righteous and turned up to eleven. She looks at adultery like she'd look at chronic nail-biting: a bad habit that adds character. I don't care about how much she curses like many others do.

I didn't hate Julie, though; far from it. In parts, her writing was charming and irreverent. I could honestly see myself reading her blog back when. But it was because of the food, the Project. She was writing about something. But quite a lot of the book wasn't about that. Julie seems to think her life is more interesting (and of course, more haaaaaaaaard) than it actually is. I didn't find myself caring much about all her long anecdotes about her “horrible” job and all the Republicans there (she mentions them ALL THE TIME). Even when they were interesting, sure enough she'd go right back to the whining, the insinuations that no one is really good enough for her (including her husband), and sexsexsexsex. You'd think she was the first to discover it. Perhaps a foretaste to her next book, Cleaving, in which she describes her affair in detail for all the world to see?

Moderately amusing fluff, easy enough to read but not that substantial. A little scattered in places, which is fine when the digressions are interesting or funny, but I don't know that I care that much about all Julie's friends and their various romantic entanglements, you know? Particularly since I couldn't really keep her friends separate in my head. At its best when writing about the food, unsurprisingly, and really gets into the visceral and messy parts of cooking.

Update after watching the movie per the Bookriot challenge - movie was better, though oddly Julie comes off worse in the movie? The book doesn't have much of a narrative arc, so the movie tried to create one by adding in some marital drama (arising out of a truly juvenile tantrum by Julie). The best parts of the movie were pretty much all Julia and Paul Child's life in France and Julia learning to cook. Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci are so wonderful and this made me want an entire movie starring them, instead of half of one.

(Bookriot Read Harder 2016 Challenge: #18 Read a book that was adapted into a movie, then watch the movie. Debate which is better.)

Julie and Julia is the autobiographical story of how Julie Powell decided to cook (and blog) her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking in one year's time. Feeling lost at her government agency secretarial job, and facing the reality of her approaching 30th birthday, Julie decides she needs some goal or purpose in her life. Encouraged by her husband Eric, she embarks on her culinary journey that includes such feats as splitting a marrow bone, creating aspic, cooking a live lobster, and boning a duck.

If only the story had focused on her adventures in the kitchen, I may have been a bit more engrossed in the action. However, it seemed like a great deal of the book focused on the sexual adventures of Julie's friends. Which would have been ok (I get that a major theme of the book is her trying to compare fine foods to good sex) if only she weren't so whiny about it all. Whining about her job is one thing - being a secretary for a really depressing government agency overlooking the giant hole in the ground that was once the Twin Towers isn't fun - but whining because she married her high school sweetheart and isn't having all of the adulterous relationships enjoyed by her friends? Give me a break. Whining about her cramped kitchen space with dubious pipping? Sure, that can't be fun to deal with, especially when you are making mounds of dirty dishes on a daily basis. But whining because you have to cook amazingly delicious food on a daily basis? Umm, no, you signed up for that. Her attitude ping pongs between “I am so lucky I get to do this and have amazing support and an adoring husband” and “Woe is I, for I must cook, and work, and I have only had adult relations with very few men. Sniffle.” The inconsistency of her attitude is a really annoying and more than slightly off-putting.

On top of her attitude, the book itself has a somewhat scattered and unorganized tone. I mean, in general she recounts her tale chronologically, with the insertion of important flashback scenes, but she tends to ramble and wander from topic to topic as she slowly comes back to the point at hand. On occasion I found some of her thoughts to be witty, and I can see how her more conversational style would be good for a daily blog, where the scope was more limited and the content more focused. But more often the writing in the book left me re-reading sentences and trying to wrangle the mess of English in front of my into a cohesive thought. I found the most enjoyable segments to be the small inserts that speculate the lives of Paul and Julia Child. Honestly, Paul Child was my favorite character in the entire book and he only amounted to just over 10 pages of action. The only other consistently amusing segment was the highlighted reader comments from her blog.

Despite all this I did finish the book within a few days time. Which is good because I think if I had put it down I would not have picked it back up again. I am also grateful that the book was bought used - at least I didn't sink a ton of money into it, and I won't feel bad at all about selling it back to the bookshop. I love the movie, so I suppose it was fated that I would read the book. I almost wish I hadn't. In the film Amy Adams does a wonderful job of taking this neurotic and abrasive secretary and turning her into a quirky and relatable individual. The movie also does a much better job of focusing on the story at hand - enriching one's life through cooking - because it focuses on Julia Child's story (played by the sublime Meryl Streep) as much as it does Julie Powell's. I am not one who often champions a movie over a book, but in this case the movie is undeniably better, most likely because the screenplay was written by Nora Ephron (of You've Got Mail and Sleepless in Seattle fame) who knows how to tell a compelling and cohesive story. All things considered, my final recommendation is this: skip the book, watch the movie.

I picked up Julie & Julia after falling in love with the movie adaptation. The film was such a delightful experience that I craved more—the kind of behind-the-scenes insight that only a book can provide. Before watching the movie, I hadn’t heard of Julie Powell or Julia Child, but after some quick online research, I became fascinated by both women and rushed to the nearest bookstore to grab a copy.

As someone who typically avoids non-fiction, especially biographies and autobiographies, I was initially hesitant. I spent some time flipping through the pages to see if it would truly resonate with me. Before I knew it, I was completely engrossed and couldn’t put it down.

What struck me most about Julie & Julia is how it doesn’t feel like a traditional autobiography. If I hadn’t known about Julie Powell and her blog beforehand, I would have assumed it was a work of fiction—light and captivating, much like an entertaining contemporary novel. The story flows so naturally that I devoured it in nearly a single day.

Some readers have described Julie Powell’s writing as hysterical, but I don’t agree. To me, her style is alive. Her honesty, vivid storytelling, and sharp humor make the book feel authentic and unfiltered. She doesn’t try to present herself as perfect or add qualities she doesn’t possess. Instead, she embraces her flaws and humanity, making her incredibly relatable and likable.

I’m enormously grateful to the filmmakers for introducing me to Julie Powell and Julia Child, two remarkable women with very different yet equally inspiring stories. I wholeheartedly recommend Julie & Julia not only to fans of autobiographies and cooking but also to anyone who enjoys witty, heartfelt narratives with a strong voice. Whether you’re drawn to the culinary world, personal journeys, or simply a good story, this book is a joy to read.

Deep sigh. I loved the movie, and loved [b:My Life in France 5084 My Life in France Julia Child http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1165517460s/5084.jpg 1602216]... but I felt saddened by Julie & Julia. All I sensed was desperation, frustration at a life that doesn't have to be that way. Powell is searching, sometimes angrily and even nastily, and I wonder how her life has been after the end of her Project (the year of Julia Child). There seems to be some bitterness in Ms Powell, and it comes out too much in her book. I feel sorry for her, and sorry to have read her book: it's TMI, more than I needed to know.If you enjoyed the film, please consider relishing those memories: skip the book.

I probably should have just stuck to the movie, the book was just OK. I found Julie to be self-absorbed and whiny and just not all that likable to be honest. Sure there were funny parts, but overall a disappointing read for me...

This book was so self-absorbed and boring I couldn't finish it. Not to mention vulgar and uninteresting. A disservice to Julia Child.

Pretty funny, but can get long at times. Made me want to try a vodka gimlet to get through life's troubles.

Mmmm...Biography & Memoirs? or Cooking, Food & Wine? A little of both. But it really doesn't matter what this book is about because Julie Powell can write. The account of her self-appointed task to prepare all the recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking never bogs (blogs?) down; she weaves into her book stories of Julia's introduction to cooking and her own bouts with infertility and her friends' relationship ups and downs as well as, of course, her experiments with French cooking. Delightful.