Book Club : May Selection “The Paris Wife”

I was stubborn about this selection a while back. SO many people recommended that I read this book and I partly think the timing wasn’t right. I hadn’t read a book for a while before picking up “The Paris Wife”  by Paula McLain and I am so glad I did. This was the book that started the idea for the Book Club. I needed something or someone to prompt me to pick up a book and read. I really enjoyed this one but once you are finished with a good book you either need a recommendation from someone or you stop reading. We have so many distractions in life between living every day, social media, work, and relationships.

I loved “The Paris Wife” for so many reasons. First off it gave a different perspective to Hemingway from a woman’s point of view. The book is written in the voice of Hadley, Hemingway’s first wife. They first start off in Chicago just blocks from where I live now. As I read the book I kept thinking we have walked the same streets. They fell in love and it was a romantic courtship. You fall in love with Hemmingway as a person from Hadley’s point of view in the early days. As Hemmingway grows as an author you see their relationship grows apart. For many reasons. 

Hemingway and Hadley move to Paris which you will read about their life when they first arrived in Paris and the struggles that they encountered both with the city and their marriage. If you enjoyed “Midnight in Paris” this will take you right there but in the pages of a novel. You will be able to imagine Paris in the 1920’s Jazz Age Paris with the Fitzgeralds and Gertrude Stein. 

If you haven’t read this I highly recommend picking up a copy through Amazon or your local library. 

Past Book Club Selections include:

January: “Bonjour Kale” By Kristen Beddard 

February: “The Little Paris Bookshop” by Nina George

March: “The Perfume Collector” by Kathleen Tessaro

April: “My Life in France” by Julia Child