Review 
Julie & Julia by Julie Powell
2005
307 pages
“365 days, 524 recipes, 1 tiny apartment kitchen”
An almost 30-something temp in NYC who was frustrated with life goals and her career path, decides to tackle Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking in one year and blogs about it. Hilarious.
I took notes and jotted down a few terms/words…
pg 60 – ‘not simple, maybe, but easy.’
pg. 92 – Where are we going? How did we get here? IMPATIENT for more Julia anecdotes
pg 136 – baked cucumbers?
I would have liked a LOT more Julia in this book. Many chapters begin with real letters written by Paul Child during the days he was courting Julia or excerpts from Julie Powell’s mind of what she imaged might have been happening those days… These were good and too infrequent. Like being allowed a finger taste of an awesome recipe and being denied a true portion.
Of course, I loved the non-Julia parts (which we can say here are the ‘Julie’ parts) and if it had more Julia/Paul stuff, then it would have been too long and I probably would have never ever read it. I dislike long books. (raspberries to those of you who are gleefully pointing at The Pillars of the Earth on my tbr. RASPBERRY!) I am thinking of reading another Julia Child bio… someday.
So. Other than a feeling of ‘uh oh, where’s she going with this?!’, I did enjoy the ride. But I was often thinking to myself, “Self, where the heck is she going here?” and even more frequently wondering, “Hey Self? Did you follow how we GOT here?!” Like a good writer, she did sum up each chapter with a return to the theme at the start. For a book that supposedly chronicles a time span, the book feels disjointed and jumps around and back and forth and all, HUH?! Wha?! But still very fun.
I wish I could say I was inspired to attempt even one of the crazy recipes in Child’s cookbook. Would it be acceptable to say I’m inspired enough to have my husband try one?! It’s wild to consider that Ms. Powell attempts this project when she wouldn’t even eat eggs. She learns. I must say, I was very impressed. I also have a few movies to put on my watch list: Laurel Canyon, True Romance. How did I miss these?
FOUR STARS. I would not mind at all to be invited to dinner for any recipe cooked up by Julie Powell and I’ll bring the gimlet makings…
I am SO looking forward to the movie!
WORDS
bleaders – what Julie Powell called the readers of her blog.
jalousie – type of window: a window with glass louvers. 
prolix – tediously prolonged or tending to speak or write at great length.
vertiginous(ly) – dizzy: having or causing a whirling sensation; liable to falling
savarin (as in ‘pan’) – a sponge cake baked in a ring mold.
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