Anstey Harris

A BOOK OF THE MONTH CLUB PICK AN INDIE NEXT PICK Jojo Moyes meets Eleanor Oliphant in Goodbye, Paris, an utterly charming novel that proves that sometimes you have to break your heart to make it whole. Grace once had the beginnings of a promising musical career, but she hasn’t been able to play her cello publicly since a traumatic event at music college years ago. Since then, she’s built a quiet life for herself in her small English village, repairing instruments and nurturing her long- distance affair with David, the man who has helped her rebuild her life even as she puts her dreams of a family on hold until his children are old enough for him to leave his loveless marriage. But when David saves the life of a woman in the Paris Metro, his resulting fame shines a light onto the real state of the relationship(s) in his life. Shattered, Grace hits rock bottom and abandons everything that has been important to her, including her dream of entering and winning the world’s most important violin-making competition. Her closest friends—a charming elderly violinist with a secret love affair of his own, and her store clerk, a gifted but angst-ridden teenage girl—step in to help, but will their friendship be enough to help her pick up the pieces? Filled with lovable, quirky characters, this poignant novel explores the realities of relationships and heartbreak and shows that when it comes to love, there’s more than one way to find happiness.

A Novel

Goodbye, Paris

I really liked this book. I thought the descriptions of the instruments would make me bored but, as an audio book, they were actually very beautiful.

Lauren Lopez

It took me a few chapters to become invested in this book. The story is told in the point of view of Grace Atherton, a former cello player and current violin maker. You quickly learn that Grace is 1/2 of a love affair, and you learn that this love affair isn't quite like many others. The affair Grace is having with David has gone on for 8 years. I immediately disliked David. He had a "too good to be true" quality about him. This is probably because while Grace was singing his praises, I couldn't get past his infidelity and insistence that he couldn't leave his wife "for the sake of his children." At one point, Grace mentions that she does not even know his children's names because "if we dissection his relationships he would feel disloyal and dishonest," and I couldn't help but my roll my eyes. 

You quickly learn how much David has compartmentalized his life when he and Grace are caught on video together after he rescues a woman who falls in the train tracks in Paris. He is suddenly a hero and the video of the rescue quickly becomes viral. David and his wife are prominent figures in their community due to their lines of work, so it becomes an even bigger deal when the public discovers that Grace is his mistress. The publicity leads to Grace finding out that her relationship with David isn't the only secret he's been keeping and she finds herself dealing with the aftermath on her own.

She is struggling with how to handle the thought of losing David as he is the only person she's been close to in years. Her parents have passed and she has been a loner since she was asked to leave music school as a young adult. The story began to get more interesting as Grace became closer to two surprising characters as she started a journey to finding herself and the courage to play music again. Nadia is a fiery teenager who is dealing with her parents' divorce and the hardships of finding out who her real friends are. Mr. Williams an eighty-something year old customer of Grace's shop who can relate to Grace's brokenness over someone who no one knew to be hers. This unlikely duo teams up to bring Grace back from the brink and encourage her to follow her dreams. 

If you enjoy a feel-good story about friendship and finding oneself after life has dealt its fair share of bad hands, then I would suggest this for you. It is a story about discovery and coming to terms with one's past rather than outrunning it. It's not the page turner that will have you dying to know what happened next, but I can assure you when you finish you will give a relieving sigh and say "that was nice..."

Anika | @chaptersofmay

2.5 stars. 

Firstly, this book is described as “Jojo Moyes meets Eleanor Oliphant” and I just can’t understand this comparison. Majority of Moyes books and Eleanor Oliphant were five star reads for me, but I didn’t get a similar vibe from this book at all. 

As soon as I started the book, I didn’t like the main characters. David is a selfish, narcissist who doesn’t understand the meaning on loyalty. I can’t comprehend how Grace, a seemingly intelligent and self-respecting woman, would bother with someone for 8 years, especially when they give you nothing but empty promises and half (or actually, a third) of their heart. I found her frustrating, because I just wanted her to wake up and realise this relationship was a waste of time. 

Grace is talented, but has faced a lot of trauma in her life, some of it unimaginable, which moved me. I felt for her in certain chapters, but in others she was irritating. But, that means she has flaws which is what makes her more realistic. 

Nadia and Mr Williams are the real winners of this tale, and their friendship with Grace is what saved the book for me. It wasn’t until I was around 70% through that I found the story to be interesting, which was a shame. 

Nadia is a typical teen, maybe a little extra, but nonetheless, a good person at heart. She deals with the struggles of growing up in a broken household, which trying to navigate friendships and her talent. Mr Williams is a wise man, and has such a gentle giant personality. I loved him! As Grace says, “I cannot believe so much compassion can come from one lonely old man. I want to tear out my heart and give it to him.”

I did find myself wanting to skip bits. A lot of the detail felt unnecessary and fell flat. The frustration built up in the beginning just annoyed me. The fact that Grace wasted so much of her life didn’t seem to make sense. While the story was “meh” for me, the description of music, the unlikely friendship between lonely people, and the uplifting idea of real triumph is what managed to earn this book a few stars.

* International Bestseller * A Book of the Month Club Pick* The Little Paris Bookshop meets Jojo Moyes in Goodbye, Paris, an utterly charming novel that proves that sometimes you have to break your heart to make it whole. From the simple melody of running her violin shop to the full-blown orchestra of her romantic interludes in Paris with David, her devoted partner of eight years, Grace Atherton has always set her life to music. Her world revolves entirely around David, for Grace’s own secrets have kept everyone else at bay. Until, suddenly and shockingly, one act tips Grace’s life upside down, and the music seems to stop. It takes a vivacious old man and a straight-talking teenager to kick-start a new song for Grace. In the process, she learns that she is not as alone in the world as she had once thought, that no mistake is insurmountable, and that the quiet moments in life can be something to shout about… Filled with charming and lovably flawed characters—and illuminated with the undeniable romance and magic of Paris—Goodbye, Paris is a poignant, compulsively readable novel that shows us that when it comes to love, there’s more than one way to find happiness.

Goodbye, Paris A Novel

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