You Had Me At Bonjour

by Jennifer Bohnet

[Leah]

When Jennifer Bohnet emailed me a few days ago to offer me the opportunity to review her new book You Had Me At Bonjour, I had to tell that I was a little bit ahead of her, because I had already downloaded the book! As soon as I spotted it on Netgalley - I'd been waiting for it to pop up, in fact - I downloaded it, and I couldn't wait to get stuck in after thoroughly enjoying Jennifer's last novel I'm Virtually Yours. The best thing about Jennifer's novels is that they're quite short, and very, very sweet because sometimes you really don't want a 5 hour novel, you want something that can be completed in the time it takes to watch a film, or less. Before anyone starts panicking, though, You Had Me At Bonjour isn't a novella, it's just not a super long novel. It's whatever is between "novel" and "novella" in the dictionary ;)

I was very much looking forward to diving in to You Had Me At Bonjour, and I liked that it eschewed the typical Chick Lit fashion of being about a twenty-something, instead Jessie is a forty-something divorcee who after being left by her husband, decided to take a very late, but much needed gap year in France. I very much admired the fact that she was willing to take a year out of her regular life, and go live in France, along, by herself, in what was her first time living alone, ever. It's a very brave thing to do - something a colleague at work has done, and probably not something I could do myself (not in a foreign country, anyway - it's a different matter if you can speak the language, I suppose).

Jessica's year in France is chronicled in her diary, where she can be as grumpy and honest as she liked - and she was, at times perhaps a bit too much (calling her best friend a cow and a bitch, at the same time, which made me cringe). I also cringed at her text speak, that ommitted all vowels (in this day and age of autocorrect, there's no excuse for text speak!). But for the most part I loved the novel. Jessica has a lovely year in France, and it was lovely to be there on her journey with her as she made new friends, and had new experiences (including a trip to the Monaco GP that had me in jealous fits, even though it was fictional). I really enjoyed getting to know Jessie's neighbours, and it was fascinating to see how her time in France would change her and whether that would be for the better or not. A great read, and I can't wait for Jennifer Bohnet's next offering!This review was originally posted on Girls Love To Read