Saturday 25 August 2012

Review: Anna and the French Kiss - Stephanie Perkins

Anna and the French Kiss
Title: Anna and the French Kiss
Author: Stephanie Perkins
Publisher: Dutton
Release Date: 02 December 2010
Date Read: August 2012
Rating: ★★

I need my dosage of chick-lit every now and then, but I'm usually hesitant to venture into this genre. Most are just cheesy and unrealistic. But Anna and the French Kiss was neither cheesy nor unrealistic.

It was an adorable, easy, light read filled with youthful innocence. Oh, to be a teenager... in France!

Anna's life is uprooted when her father sends her to a boarding school in France for her senior year. She has to leave everything behind- her best friend, her family, a great job and a budding relationship with her crush- and start anew in a place where she knows no one, with an unfamiliar environment, culture and language.

But things start to look up when she makes friends with a group of fun people- Meredith, Rashmi, Josh and St Clair. Anna takes hold of her opportunities; discovering new interests and entertaining old ones, learning French culture, enjoying the thrill of a first love and just being a teenager.

Anna was kind of annoying at the beginning. She kept on complaining and whining and whinging about going to live in France. I know it's different and unfamiliar and change is scary but IT'S FRANCE! I got over it, but still.

Perkins did an awesome job of making Anna relatable. The author captured the voice of a normal teenager and straight away, we can empathize with Anna's character. Sure, she was a bit melodramatic at times, we all are, but it elevated to humour and made everything better.

The chemistry between Anna and Etienne/St Clair was electrifying. What made this book great was the fact that their relationship did not happen instantly. We get to see how it develops, how Anna and Etienne evolve from being strangers to friends, from friends to best friends, to falling in love with each other. There were such heart-warming and funny scenes between them. With the development of Anna and Etienne's relationship, you also get see how each character develop and how they face their own faults. They bring out the great things in each other and it's just adorable to see them together. They are the cutest.


Anna and the French Kiss has an enchanting backdrop that makes the story so much better than if it had been set in, say, New York. Perkins did a great job of making Paris come alive, making it such an interesting place to live in, not just visit. I wanted to go France already, but after this, I want to live there. The descriptions of Anna exploring new places were so vivid. It felt like I was walking through the streets of Paris myself, enjoying coffee in some awesome cafe (I don't even like coffee, but I wanted some right then). The food, the culture, the language, the people, the arts, the food. Everything was great and nothing sucked.

The book may have been predictable and unoriginal but Perkins managed to keep my interest throughout the whole thing. I recommend overlooking the cheesy title and the even cheesier cover (I nearly didn't) because this was an absolute fun read. If you are interested in something light and fluffy, then this is the book for you.

1 comments:

  1. Great review! The title and cover didn't grab me, but I may give it a shot after reading your review.

    Btw, I nominated you for the Versatile Blogger award! :)
    Check out my post here: http://pidginpeasbooknook.blogspot.com/2012/08/versatile-blogger-award.html

    ReplyDelete

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