Julie and Julia (the book)

So far I've only read the book; I'll probably tell you more when the movie comes out on DVD and I see it next month or so.

I enjoyed it. When I realized how big a pain reading the PDF from the library was, I decided that if it wasn't finished by the time it expired, with just reading it on the laptop at lunchtime, I would take the hardcover out of the library. But then I saw that Fictionwise had a 100% rebate on it, so I bought it from there.

100% rebates aren't quite the same thing as getting something for free. It's their way of getting people to sometimes send them money even if they're mostly shopping on micropay rebates. So you shouldn't get the 100% rebate if you aren't going to use it to buy something you really want, but if there are several books on your wishlist that you're intending to give them money for, you might as well give them money for something else, and then get the books you really want for free. So I finished Julie and Julia in the comfort of my normal reading device.

I discussed it with a friend who said she'd enjoyed it, but she had several friends who hadn't because of the liberal use of the f-word. This could be another post, but the conclusion of the other post would be that I don't believe in judging people because of their use of that diction, but I don't use it because I'm aware that there are a lot of people who do.

In any case, it was fun to read about someone tackling all those recipes hardly anyone does these days. She finishes with the Pâté de Canard en Croûte, where you bone the duck and stuff it with pâté and then bake it inside of a pastry shell. Most food writers wouldn't describe their hysterical weeping fits when the pastry went straight from a too-dry heap to a buttery puddle.

The other impressive thing was actually doing it at all. I've been feeling heroic for just getting a blog entry out there every day, when I don't even have a job or a commute. She not only did a blog post in the morning before work, but put together a shopping list, then shopped on the way home and cooked after that. She got some help on the shopping and cooking from her husband and friends, but really it was a pretty heroic effort.

I thought that the book was a little long for the material, but of course that may well make it a better movie.

Related posts:

1. Julie and Julia (the movie)
2. Agent to the Stars, by John Scalzi
3. What ereader device do I recommend