The movie creating all the buzz under this title is really a montage, based on both this book and Julia Child's own My Life in France (also reviewed on Myshelf), with many saying that Julia's story is the dominant part. I haven't seen the movie yet, but I was definitely curious about the books.

I wasn't really sure what I'd make of this one, the one with the odd premise about someone I'd never heard of before, but the opening completely hooked me:

"...the road to hell is paved with leeks and potatoes".

Despite that opening, the movie pairing it with Julia's story, and the overall premise, it's not really about the food and doesn't include recipes. It's about life, and one woman's attempt to make something of her own, out of control seeming one, by cooking her way through Julia Child's Mastering The Art of French Cooking. Both the book and learning to cook well already had meaning in her life, while Julia as role model was, well... Julia—generous, larger than life, exuberant and worlds away from "nothing but a secretary on a road to nowhere, drifting toward frosted hair and menthol addiction".

Talk about the recipes wraps around a filling made up of Julie's life—family, friends, and her occasional epiphanies. From realizing that simple is not the same as easy to her final understanding that the real attraction of the book isn't the food, it's the fragrance of possibilities coming from its pages.

In between is a lot of humor, swearing, whining, chaos, emotional upheaval, and food. I don't often laugh out loud while reading, but this got me going three times—once with a warped sense of humor description of trussed chickens, another time over a conversation with the woman who runs the best S&M dungeon in lower Manhattan, and all through the lobsters.

It's not for the faint of heart. There's marrow and offal, Julie swears constantly, and conversations include a friend's proposal to make it rich designing furniture for sex. While Julie will make you alternatively want to shake her, hug her, and scream at her to lose the self-pity and / or whining for 2 freaking seconds in a row. But if you are open enough to possibilities (see above) to not let that get in the way, it's a great read. I just devoured it.

The author's claim to not be a very good actress doesn't hold true, as she reads very effectively—with emotional range and clear differentiation between characters. Highly recommended.