Anna is forced to pack up and leave her home, her friends and her cute co-worker Toph - all for a year's stay in the School for America in Paris (or, SOAP). It's Paris - the city of love, bread and art. Who would say no to this opportunity? Sadly, for Anna, it wasn't quite what she wanted.
But when the smiley-and-apparently-English Etienne St. Clair appears, Anna starts to think otherwise. With nine months in Paris and Etienne driving her nuts (read: he's got a freaking girlfriend!), will Anna get what's right for her?
Hello and good evening, dear readers! Tonight, I'm going to review Stephanie Perkins' book entitled 'Anna and the French Kiss'. I bought it recently along with Trese (which is equally as great!) and was able to read it all in one day. The read more button is there if you'd like to dwell on my review even more!
Small spoilers lie ahead. Please read with caution!
Here's some background. When I was at Shangri-La last weekend, I ended up at Power Books and decided to get some books to buy because, hell - it's summer. I ended up picking up a copy of Candy magazine (don't judge.), the Filipino-made comic book entitled Trese, and was stuck on whether to get this gem or something else.
I decided to text a good friend of mine named Kayla, who's into reading herself. I asked her about this book and the follow-up which I thought was a separate book (Lola and the Boy Next Door), and she told me to buy Anna first since Lola contained spoilers. So, trusting her good taste (seriously, she's amazing.) I bought the three. I read Trese first and finished it within two days, and then followed up on Anna.
Truth be told, I wasn't so sure if I'd enjoy Anna. It had been some time since I picked up a good romantic read, but my classmates were raving about this so why the hell not?
Although having your typical boy-meets-girl-and-BOOM-love storyline, it's actually much deeper than that. Anna explores not just different plotlines, but different people as well. Anna was a character I genuinely liked, and she was actually a character who made stupid-as-heck choices and learned from them. She felt remorse for her actions later in the book and made up for it herself.
Additionally, I like how Paris wasn't flattened to be the ooh la-la city of amore people always stereotype it to be. Stephanie Perkins shows the other cultural aspects to the city, which I appreciated a lot.
Aside from that, I liked the characterization of the different characters, espeically that of Anna and Etienne's. When Anna finally stood up to Etienne instead of letting her feelings for him rule over, she was pretty much protecting herself from the pain she thought she'd get. And that's understandable as well as human. People may argue that she was being overly cruel, but I digress.
Anna was just protecting herself. He had a girlfriend and many other girls were flocking over to him left and right. Who knew if he would play her? (Let's be honest, though. He wouldn't.)
Anna and the French Kiss is a refreshing read. It has a nice flow to it, and explores different choices, different plots all united under a single one. It has a female lead who thinks for herself and doesn't let herself succumb to loving a guy for the hell of it. The novel explores the road to love, more especially the slips and slides that one may encounter on that road. It provides the reader with the narrator's experience, who learns and forgives and fights as she goes on with her different encounters.
Simply to say, I loved it. I'd like my own Etienne St. Clair now, please.
**Special thanks to Kayla for recommending the book to me! She is a blogger who reviews books, interviews different authors, and a whole lot more. You'll be linked to her blog if you click her name, but in case you missed it, here it is! The Bookish Owl
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