To Live in Paradise [Paperback]

Renee Roosevelt Denis (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

In Haiti, Renne Denis met and married a charismatic Italian adventurer, Gustav Dalla Valle. Four years later, despite Renee's misgivings, they moved to Los Angeles, where her spearfishing husband developed Scubapro and became a fiercely competitive businessman. His egotism and jealousy became intolerable, so Renee fled to French Polynesia. There she married a handsome but irresponsible Tahitian. Pursuing his own dreams of fortune, her husband, Teva, abandoned her, leaving her to cope with two small children and his traditional Polynesian parents. But Renee's tale has barely begun. To Live In Paradise is filled with fascinating stories,s and remarkable people, from Tahitian miracle cures and Club Med romances, to Renee's grandfather, Andre Roosevelt, her famous parents, and Marlon Brando. The circumstances of Renee Denis' life are unique, sometimes hilarious and sometimes heartrending as she shares her deepest feelings, her happiness and pain, her losses and strengths in a way that makes readers feel she's a long-lost friend returned at last from years of adventures. -- Midwest Book Review

Product Details

• Paperback: 346 pages
• Publisher: Lost Coast Press; 1st edition (January 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1882897072
• ISBN-13: 978-1882897070
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,630,070 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Inside look at Polynesian philosophy of life, October 22, 1998

By 

Dawn "Arleeda" (GA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Live in Paradise (Paperback)

Renee Denis came from a fascinatingand unusual family, which no doubt explains her choice of a lifestyle for herself. Her book helps one to understand why the Polynesian extended family overcomes the problems you might think would exist with so many single mothers (including the author). An amazingingly interesting life!

5.0 out of 5 stars Reconnected to a terrific tour guide thanks to Amazon..., December 12, 2009

By 

D. La Grande "detourdix" (Williams, CA (Colusa County)) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: To Live in Paradise (Paperback)

Thanks to modern technology, I had searched for an old friend & tour director colleague, Rene Roosevelt Denis & found her, here on Amazon, as author of the very stories she used to tell... around a campfire working with French groups visiting California & the Southwest National Parks in the early 1980's.

She then came to live in my collective Berkeley household of pioneers in the environmental movement.( FYI-- still active, [...]

Renee shared with us the same photos now published in her book, cooked some local dishes from her cultural encounters. I still make the polenta recipe from her first husband Gustav.

One of her #& Marlo Brando's)young Tahitian neighbors also came to live with us to study English in the San Francisco Bay Area... I had even traveled with her to Mexico to visit the place where her mother had written her life story...

Due to my own travels, we had lost contact in recent years. The last I knew was that she had gone south to finally write the story of her life... TADUM! VOICI! I was delighted to discover it... snail mail to her previous address had been returned to me as no longer at that address without a forwarded one...

Rene has such insights into how to celebrate diverse cultures, writes just like she talks. She is a gifted story teller with an unusual life full of amazing episodes!

Though I was already familiar with so many chapters in this book & each page made me nod with friendly familiarity, even without prior acquaintance of this remarkable woman, I do highly recommend this book to learn about early tourism in Haiti & Tahiti & elsewhere. Tourism is an industry ripe to acknowledge now for its decades' worth contribution to any economy & often best tool for teaching tolerance...