Title:
Goodbye Paris
Author:
Anstey Harris
Read
by: Tania Rodrigues
Publisher:
Simon & Schuster
Length:
Approximately 8 hours and 57 minutes
Source:
Review Copy from Simon & Schuster.
Thank-you!
Goodbye
Paris is a fascinating character novel where a woman finds herself after losing
it all in her middle age. I am typically
not fond of novels that are about marital affairs, but Goodbye Paris did a
great job of making me feel bad for the “other woman.” Grace Atherton was once an up and coming
celloist until a professor at her elite college destroyed her self-esteem and
kicked her out of the musical program.
Grace picked up the pieces and now has become a craftsman of beautiful
instruments. She loves her life with her
teenage clerk Nadia, customer Mr. Williams, and her longtime partner
David. She dreams of the day that David
will leave his wife when their children are grown and start their life
together. Those dreams crash down one
day when David rescues a woman at the Paris Metro station and he is suddenly on
the news. The details of his past come
out and Grace is crushed in the process.
What is David’s secret and how will Grace move forward?
The
novel had a great unique story line and the characters were wonderful. I really liked Grace’s growth throughout the
novel where she can confront her past and her present, what does she want to
really do with her life? How is she
treating her friends? Speaking of her
friends, Mr. Williams and Nadia are two of the greatest secondary characters
ever. I loved Mr. Williams back story
of being a gay man in a repressed society and I love how he helps Grace and
Nadia. Nadia is a teen with a lot of
teen angst problems and a great love of music.
They are all trying to find their way in the world and discover that
good friendships can be like a great family.
This
was a wonderful book, but I had a real hard time in the beginning because of
one of the items I have discussed on this blog before. I picked this audiobook to listen to as it
was compared to “JoJo Moyes” on the cover.
I thought it would be a humorous book, which it is not. As I got more into the novel, I realize that
the comparison must have been for the unique characters because otherwise it is
not like the novels it was compared to.
Once I got past the hurdle of my expectations, I came to really enjoy
the novel.
I
loved the narrator Tania Rodrigues and I especially loved the sound effects
when people made phone calls. I only
wish there were more sound effects in audiobooks in general.
Overall,
Goodbye Paris was a wonderful book about dealing with life's hurdles and how
friendship can help you through it.
This sounds very different to other books with this kind of theme/background
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