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jennieleigh's review against another edition
5.0
astoundingly good. loved every second of it. cried and cried.
joyousreads132's review against another edition
3.0
I don’t read a lot of memoirs or biographies like I used to do. It’s a genre that I’ve neglected simply because I’ve gotten a taste for fiction. This is one of those impulse buy, as most of my books in Adult Fiction genre. It was sitting on display for “Great Valentine’s Reads” at my local bookstore and didn’t really know at the time that I was picking up a memoir until I got home and started to read a couple of pages. To my surprise, I soon realize that I’ve read a couple of chapters in no time. So I figured, I might as well keep going.
This book is a story about a woman’s two love's in her lifetime. She’s still alive. They’re both dead. It tells a story about a successful, well-loved man but behind closed doors, he’s an insecure, jealous being. It also tells a story about a political figure loved by the current government who’d waited for her while she was going through a difficult separation. It’s a story about journalism, most specifically broadcasting. At the time when she was first starting out, women had a tougher time trying to score primetime news assignments. From Ayatollah Khomeini to the fall of the wall of Berlin, she covered it all. But the toughest assignment she’s had to face was salvaging her married life with Peter Jennings. They never seem to be in the same country at the same time, sometimes, not even on the same continent. Peter is also the most insecure person she’d ever known. Fifteen years after they married, and after two children, they divorced. There was infidelity involved.
Then she met Richard Holbrooke, a political figure who’s more recent assignment was being an adviser to Pakistan and Afghanistan relations. Theirs was a wedded bliss. He doted on her – he was perfect. But Kati Marton is not a perfect woman. She’s been unfaithful to both her deceased husbands. I tried to understand what would drive a woman to cheat on both occasions but to no avail. She claims to be apologetic. On both times, both husbands forgave her. It was difficult to reconcile this book as love stories. I just don’t see anyone claiming to love their spouses and then cheating on them during the course of their relationship. Do I sound judgemental? Perhaps. To be honest, she was more in love with Paris than the men in her life. Because her love for that city - its elegance and idiosyncrasies were almost poetic. If she was ever faithful to anything or anyone, she’s at least faithful to Paris.
As much as I had problems with Kati, there was one thing that really hit me while reading this book. It was the story of how she lost Richard, and how difficult it was to try and live after such a loss. The debilitating pain and realization that one moment you were talking to him or her on the phone and the next, you’re packing up your house because it bore too many painful memories.
This book is a story about a woman’s two love's in her lifetime. She’s still alive. They’re both dead. It tells a story about a successful, well-loved man but behind closed doors, he’s an insecure, jealous being. It also tells a story about a political figure loved by the current government who’d waited for her while she was going through a difficult separation. It’s a story about journalism, most specifically broadcasting. At the time when she was first starting out, women had a tougher time trying to score primetime news assignments. From Ayatollah Khomeini to the fall of the wall of Berlin, she covered it all. But the toughest assignment she’s had to face was salvaging her married life with Peter Jennings. They never seem to be in the same country at the same time, sometimes, not even on the same continent. Peter is also the most insecure person she’d ever known. Fifteen years after they married, and after two children, they divorced. There was infidelity involved.
Then she met Richard Holbrooke, a political figure who’s more recent assignment was being an adviser to Pakistan and Afghanistan relations. Theirs was a wedded bliss. He doted on her – he was perfect. But Kati Marton is not a perfect woman. She’s been unfaithful to both her deceased husbands. I tried to understand what would drive a woman to cheat on both occasions but to no avail. She claims to be apologetic. On both times, both husbands forgave her. It was difficult to reconcile this book as love stories. I just don’t see anyone claiming to love their spouses and then cheating on them during the course of their relationship. Do I sound judgemental? Perhaps. To be honest, she was more in love with Paris than the men in her life. Because her love for that city - its elegance and idiosyncrasies were almost poetic. If she was ever faithful to anything or anyone, she’s at least faithful to Paris.
As much as I had problems with Kati, there was one thing that really hit me while reading this book. It was the story of how she lost Richard, and how difficult it was to try and live after such a loss. The debilitating pain and realization that one moment you were talking to him or her on the phone and the next, you’re packing up your house because it bore too many painful memories.
mosleyjen's review against another edition
informative
reflective
fast-paced
2.5
An interesting life, but this book is not really about Paris! It didn’t seem that reflective to me, and was VERY name-droppy
hlogan's review against another edition
2.0
I love memoirs. Real people's lives and stories are infinitely more fascinating than fiction any day. This one is supposed to be about her story of falling in love in Paris and with Paris, but it did not hit home for me. I had never heard of Kati Marton before picking it up, but it seems she was married to several powerful and well-known men, so she was kind of a big deal - and makes sure that you know it. Her name-dropping is excessive and exclusionary of anyone in her life who is not famous. We barely hear a word about her children, sister, and friends who aren't a well-known public figure. At one point she dedicates five pages to notes she received from George W Bush, Nelson Mandela, high-level ambassadors, etc., thanking her for her fabulous dinner parties. And when she loses her second husband, presumably she had family and close friends helping her grieve and process her loss, but we don't hear about them; instead, she recounts breathlessly how Bill Clinton stopped by her house unannounced to express his condolences.
The book is ostensibly about Paris, but that thread gets dropped many times throughout the book, and when it gets picked up, it's unconvincing. All in all, not well done. She talks about all the awards and praise she's received for her other books, but I have no desire to read them, after reading this.
The book is ostensibly about Paris, but that thread gets dropped many times throughout the book, and when it gets picked up, it's unconvincing. All in all, not well done. She talks about all the awards and praise she's received for her other books, but I have no desire to read them, after reading this.
melissakuzma's review against another edition
1.0
NOTE: I listened to this on audio
This has got to be the most boringly told memoir I've ever read, and frankly, it has almost nothing to do with Paris. Kati Marton reads boring old letters, marries Peter Jennings and Richard Holbrooke and blah blah blah. I almost gave up on this several times and I honestly don't know why I ever bothered to finish it. Terrible.
This has got to be the most boringly told memoir I've ever read, and frankly, it has almost nothing to do with Paris. Kati Marton reads boring old letters, marries Peter Jennings and Richard Holbrooke and blah blah blah. I almost gave up on this several times and I honestly don't know why I ever bothered to finish it. Terrible.
cook_memorial_public_library's review against another edition
5.0
A beautiful memoir written by Kati Marton who was once married to ABC Anchor Peter Jennings and UN Ambassador, Richard Holbrooke. A beautiful, challenging, interesting and sometimes very sad story told around Paris and other locations including New York, Washington, Budapest and Bonn. A quick read, it took me less than a day to read. I was originally interested in this book because I knew she was married to Peter Jennings. I am really glad I read it and go to know who Kati Marton is. Very recommended!
--Recommended by Jenny
Check our catalog: http://encore.cooklib.org/iii/encore/search?formids=target&lang=eng&suite=def&reservedids=lang,suite&target=paris: a love story marton
--Recommended by Jenny
Check our catalog: http://encore.cooklib.org/iii/encore/search?formids=target&lang=eng&suite=def&reservedids=lang,suite&target=paris: a love story marton
judyward's review against another edition
4.0
Kati Marton has had a life-long love for Paris. She studied there in 1968 when she was in college. She served as an ABC correspondent in Europe and met Peter Jennings in Paris during their affair before they married and had two children. She bought a pied-a-terra in Paris with her husband, Richard Holbrooke, after their marriage. Marton describes her marriages to these two enorously complex, and sometimes difficult, men and it was to Paris that she retreated after the sudden death of Holbrooke. A very moving account of the highs and lows of a life lived among the A-list of the political and cultural world.
mcwmcw's review against another edition
2.0
I actually genuinely enjoyed many of the descriptions in this book; of the 6th in Paris near where my study abroad was headquartered and of life as a foreign correspondent which I found to be fascinating. However, I thought it did not well navigate the balance between her personal and professional life within the scope of ~200 pages which would have been much better suited to an in-depth exploration of either these two topics or of her time in Paris.