2007, ISBN: 0613366050

[SR: 4175706], School & Library Binding, [EAN: 9780613366052], San Val, San Val, Book, [PU: San Val], San Val, The act of writing a first novel has a lot in common with being an au pair.… More...

[SR: 4175706], School & Library Binding, [EAN: 9780613366052], San Val, San Val, Book, [PU: San Val], San Val, The act of writing a first novel has a lot in common with being an au pair. Each is often accomplished by a young, overeducated woman who believes she is the center of the universe. This can make for dull reading, and sometimes for unattended children falling down staircases. But Lily King's fine first novel--about an au pair--neatly avoids the solipsism that often plagues coming-of-age stories. In The Pleasing Hour, 19-year-old Rosie has fled New Hampshire for France after undergoing an anguishing loss: she surrendered her newborn son to her infertile, married sister. Rosie is literally hollowed out, unable to see beyond her own pain. "Nothing in my body felt right. It seemed to be ringing with pain but there was no part of me that I could point to and tell her, Here, here's where it hurts." In Paris she moves in with the Tivots: the unassuming, shambling father, Marc; the glamorous and unforgiving mother, Nicole; the beautiful daughter, Odile; the merry daughter, Lola; the momma's boy, Guillaume. Rosie steps into the highly polarized atmosphere of the Tivot household, unconsciously upsetting its equilibrium by throwing in her lot with Marc and Lola. And when the family heads off to Spain for vacation, the power balance shifts palpably, since Rosie is the only one who speaks Spanish. Even Nicole grudgingly admires her. What's more, Rosie notices Marc regarding her with the "relentless curiosity he'd had in his eye since we landed in Spain." On Mallorca, the two consummate their relationship, and the betrayal forces her to see beyond her own worries to the entrenched pains and allegiances of her host family. King cleverly iterates this message in her narrative. She occasionally, deliberately, allows each member of the Tivot family to voice the story, and this opening-up of the narrative allows the world to flow into a novel whose themes might otherwise seem petty. In the end, the author doesn't perpetrate the dull crime of youthful self-involvement--she comments on it. We care for Rosie from the start, but we like her a lot more as she comes alive to the people around her. --Claire Dederer, 2205888011, Custom Stores, 7187330011, Amazon Publishing, 13901671, Audiobooks, 14244971, Bargain Books, 13621591, Boxed Sets, 194725011, Canada Day Deals, 377366011, Christian Living Store, 263003011, For Dummies Store, 2354164011, Formats, 714830011, Kids & Family Store, 370821011, Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007, 1040638, Specialty Stores, 916520, Books, 927790, Literature & Fiction, 932480, Action & Adventure, 16164081011, Ancient & Medieval Literature, 933410, Canadian, 932108, Classics, 932240, Drama & Plays, 360739011, Erotica, 16186966011, Essays & Correspondence, 16186970011, Foreign Language Fiction, 932470, Genre Fiction, 932508, Historical Fiction, 932552, History & Criticism, 16170503011, Humour & Satire, 2056047011, Literary, 16170506011, Mythology & Folk Tales, 932624, Poetry, 933200, Short Stories & Anthologies, 1080390, United States, 933210, Women's Fiction, 927792, World Literature, 927726, Subjects, 916520, Books, 15306451, Literature, 15306521, American Literature, 15306461, Creative Writing & Composition, 15306531, English Literature, 15306511, Literary Theory, 690380011, World Literature, 15306041, Humanities, 15115321, Textbooks, 927726, Subjects, 916520, Books<

2003, ISBN: 0613366050

[SR: 4767240], School & Library Binding, [EAN: 9780613366052], San Val, San Val, Book, [PU: San Val], 2003-01-01, San Val, The Pleasing Hour is as sensuous and ambling as a river in summ… More...

[SR: 4767240], School & Library Binding, [EAN: 9780613366052], San Val, San Val, Book, [PU: San Val], 2003-01-01, San Val, The Pleasing Hour is as sensuous and ambling as a river in summer. With great delicacy, it tells how Rosie, a 19-year-old American comes to Paris to be an au pair for Marc and Nicole and their three children and recasts the family and their love. While other au pairs want to acquire fluency and a Parisian accent, Rosie needs to escape from her recent decision to act as a surrogate mother for her infertile sister. She is "guarded, flinchless", her breasts leak and she's "big and unspectacular, nothing like the cinema samples". In the home of the elegant and abrasive Nicole, she feels inconvenient and judged. King excels as she conveys the awkward peculiarity of the au pair job, which places you "en famille", while denying any real and lasting access to its intimacies. Rosie is brilliantly placed to dissect the snobbery and bourgeois concerns that Parisians are so good at and King hits the mark with wit and accuracy as the family reveal their subtle and not so subtle anti- Americanisms. As Rosie becomes a confidante, the characters develop in dimensionality and sympathy. Guillaume, the youngest, nurses unfashionable fervour for the priesthood; Lola needs love and sensitivity and misses nothing; while Odile, the eldest, begins to become aware of her desire for other girls. Despite Marc's bad posture and splayed feet, Rosie finds herself attracted to him and their adultery is handled in fresh, erotic and unexpected ways. As Nicole attains the uncanny perceptiveness of the deceived, Rosie chooses to protect her from the kind of loss she herself has suffered and leaves for Provence, to take care of an elderly woman, who once cared for Nicole. Only through this second sacrifice does Rosie learn what she needs and wants and also learns from the older woman why Nicole is so self- protected.King weaves a complex and intricate set of relationships with humour and emotional insight. The surprising shifts in alliances and loyalties are convincingly told and avoid the common traps of sentimentality and melodrama. It's both a well-toned and languid novel set against the dreamy backdrop of "the pleasing hour", the lilac light of a French dusk. -- Cherry Smyth, 426310031, Psychological, 62, Fiction, 1025612, Subjects, 266239, Books<