Chère Madame Florand,
Until I happened to look down while passing a shelf in Waldenbooks I had no idea your book existed. Thank God for serendipity. I haven’t laughed so hard over the course of an entire book in a long time. I’ve never been to Paris but after reading about how you met your French husband while studying there, I still don’t think I want to go. After all, it’s full of French people, right? ;) Though you do make the chocolate stores sound awfully appealing….Now if extended an invitation to Say-bas-tee-YON’s (BTW, love the way your redneck Georgia brothers pronounce his name) uncles’ farm outside Paris, especially if one of their two day parties was planned, I’d be there in a heartbeat. My God the food sounds divine, the views must be spectacular and surely with a GPS system, I could find it. Or maybe not.
And after reading about your four wedding ceremonies, I can see the appeal of elopement. Just kidding. Let’s forget the first American civil ceremony done only to ease the bureaucracy standing in the way of Sebastien’s American work permit. And the clogged septic system that had to be dug out afterwards. Your religious ceremony surrounded by huge magnolia trees deep in the heart of the South sounded lovely. If only July wasn’t one of the hottest months of the year, filled with mosquitoes and chiggers and the whole experience augmented by having to chop up those two enormous oak trees that covered your parent’s entire front yard. But that’s why God invented chain saws, hein?
Now, your first French ceremony had me in tears of laughter. I just reread the whole thing and about busted a gut all over again. It’s truly amazing that Sebastien’s father, uncles and cousins didn’t lynch the priest. That’s one wedding video I’d pay to see, especially when the priest said,
“Marriage should be for love and not just because you’re looking for a retirement pension. That first person read so poorly you might not have understood him, but he said that love is not jealous. What this means is that no matter how much the man has his soccer matches, his bars, and his nights out with his friends, the woman should not tell herself that he has his life easy. And no matter how many electrical appliances the woman has in the kitchen, the man should not tell himself that she has her life easy. ‘Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.’ What beautiful words of St. Paul, that love endures all things. What this means is that just because a woman is getting married isn’t an excuse for her to stop trying to look like Claudia Schiffer. This is something she must strive for all her life, for love of her husband. ‘Love is patient,’ St Paul tells us. ‘Love is kind.’ So no matter how much your wife deserves a beating from time to time, young Sebastien, you should try to be generous and restrain yourself.”
I’m sure by this point, I’d be choking with laughter like your guests were. And when the priest said, “And I think we’ve wasted more than enough time on this little repeat ceremony of theirs. So let’s go,” I’d probably be rolling in the aisles too. I must say that after having to clean out a second septic system, albeit one across the Atlantic ocean from the first, after the wedding party was over, you two have already faced the “for worst” part of your vows.
Thanks for a scathingly funny trip through your courtship and weddings. I wouldn’t have missed it. B+ for “Blame it on Paris.” Oh, you don’t suppose Sebastien could give me tips on buying wine, could he?
~Jayne
What a fun review! Normally I don’t like reading my reviews, because even when they’re very positive, there’s something so remote about them. But you hooked me with this one. I was laughing and thinking you would, in fact, be a great addition to one of the uncles’ parties. So let me know when you go to France! :) (Although, about the uncles’ parties: Sebastien just read the review, too, and also laughed and laughed, but ESPECIALLY when you mentioned it might be possible to find his uncles’ farmhouse with a GPS. He seemed to think you were just a tad optimistic about that one.)
Thanks so much. I’m glad you enjoyed it. And I am very deeply flattered to share the same grade with Lois McMaster Bujold.
Bienvenue Laura! Congratulations on the birth of your daughter. I’m sure you’re already hard at work looking like Claudia Schiffer again, right? Mustn’t get slack just because of diaper changing. Remember the Parisian woman in the high heeled boots. I’d love to go to one of the uncles’ parties and I’m sure with my 24 years old high-school French classes a distant memory in the crevices of my brain, I wouldn’t understand a word. ;)
Do you plan on having any more book signings? I’m sorry I missed the two around here but since I didn’t know your book existed then, I deny all responsibility! Please, please say I get a second chance. I’ll bring chocolate….
This sounds fabulous, I’m ordering it today!!
Don’t you dare mention that Parisian woman! I am still deeply aggrieved that the publication, meaning public appearances, was timed for 5 months after I had a baby. True, initially I thought I would be in tip-top shape again in only a couple of months, but that idea turned out to be…false. I had to do a photo shoot for a women’s magazine three months after my baby was born, one of those magazines with anorexic models on the cover, and once the issue is out I’ll blog about the art director’s careless instructions just “to wear something sexy…in bright colors…nothing black…no prints…preferably silk…but most important, something sexy” and my desperate trips to the mall. Trust me, you do NOT want to be staring at yourself in multiple dressing room mirrors, trying to find something you can look “sexy” in for a major woman’s magazine when you are 2 months postpartum! Unless you’re Parisian, of course; my mother-in-law was back in shape in a month.
I didn’t know you were in my area! That would be fun to meet you. I’m not doing any signings in December, mostly because stores don’t set up many signings so close to Christmas, but maybe in January.
And thank you, Tara Marie. :)
Let me guess, you wore something blue? Finally, did someone let you wear something blue? ;) Yep, I’m in this area, have been for years. I’ll check your blog for future appearances. I’d love to meet you for a glass of plonk and some fine chocolate!
No! I got all excited and hopeful about the blue, but the art director gently explained to me all of blue’s photographic faults and that they had chosen a gray background so by colors she really meant either pink or green. Which was, of course, a change from when Sebastien says “colors”, by which he usually means beige or gray. But I’m beginning to think there is an anti-blue conspiracy going on around me.
Can’t wait to meet you! Fine chocolate it is.
Jayne, I read this one over the weekend. What a fun read. And your review is perfect. Thanks for finding this one!!
It was my luck to find it in the first place and my pleasure to talk it up. I’m so glad you enjoyed it too. :)
[...] And, if you aren’t tired of us yet, you can read all about how we got started and what we think of this whole blogging gig at Laura Florand’s site. She wrote Blame it On Paris which Jayne loved. [...]
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