Tuesday 16 February 2016

Delacourt, Grégoire "The list of my desires"



Delacourt, Grégoire "The list of my desires" (aka My wish list) (French: La liste de mes envies) - 2012

I love reading a French book from time to time but I love it even more if it is an interesting book.

This one was suggested by one of our French members in the international book club. It's an easy read, at least concerning the language, so I shall try to read more books by the author.

Jocelyne is married to Jocelyn, they have two grown up children, both work, their marriage seems perfect on the outside but there are a lot of cracks in the shell. When something unexpected happens, Jocelyne can't cope and everything seems to fall to pieces.

Interesting read. What I loved best was that the protagonist thinks about what is important in life and what isn't and that making such a list can change your perspectives.

Jocelyne loves and reads "Belle Du Seigneur" (Her Lover) which I had never heard about. It's written by Swiss author Albert Cohen of whom I'd never heard before, either.

We discussed this in our book club in November 2015.

From the back cover:

 "What would it take to change your life? Jocelyne is 47. She lives in a small provincial French town, runs her own dressmaking shop, has been married to the same man for what seems like an eternity, has had two children and lives a very ordinary existence. In fact so ordinary that she is beginning to wonder what happened to her, to all those dreams she had when she was seventeen. Then comes the chance to change her life completely - but should she? For when Jocelyne begins to look at her life and its small pleasures - her friendship with the twins who run the hairdresser next door, her weekends away, her sewing blog - she realises that maybe ordinary isn't so bad. Until the decision is taken out of her hands... The List of my Desires is a wonderfully heart-warming novel about what we value in life and the search for happiness."

3 comments:

  1. I've not read many French books, this one sound interesting, so off to Amazon.

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  2. Marianne, I meant to tell you that we saw the German comedian Hafe Kerkling on a British comedy show called Would I Lie to You--he was hilarious.

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  3. Oh dear, one day you will have a house full of books you bought because of my blog. Sooo sorry. ;)

    Anyway, really happy you saw Hape Kerkeling and liked him. He is so hilarious yet very very nice. Must see whether I can watch that show.

    Have a good day,
    Marianne

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