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| Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously | 
 enlarge | Author: Julie Powell
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Category: Book
List Price: $13.99
Buy Used: $1.93
You Save: $12.06 (86%)
New (61) Used (85) Collectible (1) from $1.93
Avg. Customer Rating:  63 reviews
Sales Rank: 20155
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 336
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.4 x 1.1
ISBN: 0316013269
Dewey Decimal Number: 641.5092
EAN: 9780316013260
ASIN: 0316013269
Publication Date: September 7, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Standard used condition.
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| Customer Reviews:
 This book isn't about cooking! October 15, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Julie and Julia isn't *about* cooking... Julie Powell uses cooking, or specifically Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking", as a theme to tell a story. What it's really about is (I hate this term) how she "found herself". And herself is a Democrat who uses the f-word. I have to say I'm shocked at how many people gave this book bad reviews for what amounted to a few f-bombs and off-the-cuff remarks about Republicans (and it's not like she goes on for pages and pages with either... seriously, who bristles at swear words anymore??). It's a shame that people will give a book a bad review because it presents an opposing viewpoint - Julie's writing is excellent. I thought this book was quite interesting and funny. Hardcore conservatives might want to steer clear, but I think anyone who enjoys food or cooking will like this. In fact, I may get a copy of MtAoFC and try some of the recipes myself!
 Wasn't horrible, but still a let down August 29, 2007
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
I love to cook, and I'm also almost 30, so when I picked this book up at a bookstore at Grand Central Station a couple of months back, I was excited to read it. I read the first chapter and wasn't impressed, so I didn't come back to it for months, until I finally broke down and finished it last weekend amongst laundry loads.
Like the other reviewers, I found the book to be very little about cooking, and more about a rather immature perspective on what seems to be a life with little to complain about. I didn't get the impression that Julie even LIKED to cook, so that kinda bothered me, since I thought it would be more of a celebration. She frankly struck me as someone with too much time on her hands who took on the "Project" merely for something to do.
It was ok, and an easy read, but very self-indulgent and precocious.
 Don't waste your money. August 13, 2007
6 out of 12 found this review helpful
I was really looking forward to reading this book, but couldn't get more than 50 pages in when I had to stop. I bought this book thinking it was about the ups and downs of trying to follow Julia Childs' French recipes, but it had little of that. It's mainly filled with whining, bad language, and her overall immature views on life. If you want a book on food steer clear of this one.
Don't waste your time August 10, 2007
6 out of 9 found this review helpful
This book starts out with a good premise, but then quickly deteriorates to the story of ME ME ME, rather than a cooking adventure.
I kept hoping the book would improve, but this morning I decided that I couldn't read any more. I have other books on my to-read shelf that merit my attention now!
If you must try it, get it from the library or borrow from a friend. Or you can have my copy...
 Julie & Julie August 8, 2007
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This book was recommended to me by a friend who said little to convince me to read it. I promptly forgot the title. Months later, I was trolling the shelves of a bookstore one day, saw the paperback, ignored it, forgot which shelf it was on, decided to go back to it, became frantic because I couldn't remember where it was, treked through the store retracing my steps to find it at last. I bought it and began reading it. I just finished it.
It's all about Julie and her personal commitment to a goal. Her quest of making 524 Julia Child's recipes in 365 days would never enter the minds of 99.9% of goal setters - including master chefs. However, it is Julie's goal and she does achieve it. She includes friends, family and the world at large making herself vulnerable and allowing them all to observe her either personally or through her daily blog. Somehow, she doesn't say exactly how - she even gets the attention of the media and Julia Child herself.
Her writing reflects the world surrounding her as she often doggedly flails away at each recipe - including her less than desirable government secretarial job, co-workers, home, family, pets, friends, political climate, post 9/11 New York.
I came to know and like Julie and her alter ego, Julia, who comes to exist in Julie's brain. Julie's Julia lives in another time and world. Her Julia is brash, adventuresome, young, healthy and bold.These are all traits Julie displays herself as she goes through this year with a 40-year-old cookbook. She finds Julia and finds herself. She is an explorer/adventurer with the mouth of a sailor. That's okay, because that is Julie and she reveals herself through her honest writing.
Julie endeared herself to me - I am way past thirty years of age - but I can remember the trials and tribulations of being 29 going on 30. You just have to love someone who wears a Madonna bustier/corset to work and then goes home to work barefoot in her little NY kitchen to perform culinary miracles with a calf's brain, butter, cream and wine.
No, this is not a cookbook - if you want that - take a trip to a bookstore and buy yourself one. This is a memoir of a year spent in self-discovery - as complicated as the recipes in Julia Child's masterpiece of French cookery.
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