28 January, 2012 | By: Rhee

Review: Anna and the French Kiss

Anna and the French Kiss





Title: Anna and the French Kiss
Author: Stephanie Perkins
Pages: 372
Published: 2010

Summary: Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris - until she meets Etienne St. Clair: perfect, Parisian (and English and American, which makes for a swoon-worthy accent), and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home.

As winter melts into spring, will a year of romantic near - misses end with the French kiss Anna - and readers - have long awaited?

Review: This was such an adorable book and I really wish that I could just curl up inside of it and live inside of Anna's and Etienne's world. I started it with the intention of liking the book by the end but not loving it, and I think I fell in love by the end of it all. Living in Paris and experiencing an entirely new world with a group of friends that are absolutely wonderful in their own quirky ways is something that I really wish I could do, and I was glad that I got the chance to experience it through Anna's eyes.

Moving to a new place is always a hard thing, and I can't even imagine having to move to an entire new country for my last year of high school, like Anna did, but at the same time it'd be an amazing experience to move to Paris for your senior year. I could relate to Anna the entire book, even though I've never been in her exact position. Her friends were all wonderful, and each one had their own positives and negatives. I really liked the fact that they just swooped in and took care of Anna, letting her into their group so easily.

But I loved Etienne. Dear god, Etienne St. Clair. I wanted him so very badly, and not even as a relationship. I just wanted to be his friend because he really was just a magical person. I loved his personality and I just wanted to ruin his relationship with his girlfriend the entire time because I hated her and I didn't even know much about her except that she abandoned her friends when she graduated.

Out of all of the characters, Josh was my favourite. I just loved him and wanted to be his best friend, because he just seemed like such a cool guy. I did despise Toph though, and Anna's best friend from home. It didn't matter that I understood the reasons behind what they'd done and that I shouldn't hate them as much as I did. I still hate them, but kudos to Stephanie Perkins for at least giving me reasons why I shouldn't.

All in all, I really loved this novel and I loved the ending. Just the mere fact that Anna and Etienne managed to figure out a way to foil Etienne's father's plans was just wonderful. I very much enjoyed the fact that Etienne and Anna ended up going to schools where they could be together in college and maybe for the rest of their lives...that was wonderful too.

I adored this book and I adored that this was initially written as a NaNo novel, because that just proves that NaNo, while being the most ridiculous time of the year, is also a time where magic comes alive through writing and creatively breaking brains. This is definitely a book that I will read again, and I can't wait until I do.

Rating: ★★★★ 4/5 Stars

2 responses:

Ari (Reading After Midnight) said...

I am glad that you liked it. This is one of my favorite romances :)
I hope Josh will be part of the 3rd book (as the action takes place in Paris one more time, and our bets are that he and Isla could be together in it - oh, well, one can hope at least).

Rhee said...

This book has taken over my entire soul. I would do anything to crawl inside of it and live there forever.
I hope that Josh will be part of the third book too, and I'll join you on the bet that he and Isla could be together. I would love for that to happen!

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