Petite Anglaise [Hardcover]

Catherine Sanderson (Author)

Book Description

Release date: June 17, 2008

A young Englishwoman in Paris, juggling a dying romance and the demands of motherhood, discovers escape, excitement, and—possibly—true love when she reinvents herself with a click of the mouse as … Petite Anglaise.


She has a job in Paris, the city of her dreams, a handsome Frenchman, a beautiful bilingual toddler, and a charming apartment with breathtaking views. So why does Catherine Sanderson feel that her life is coming apart? Stuck in a relationship quickly losing its heat, overwhelmed by the burdens of motherhood, and restless in a dead-end administrative job, Catherine reads an article about starting an online diary and on a slow day at work—voilà—Petite Anglaise is born. But what begins as a lighthearted diversion, a place to muse on the fish-out-of-water challenges of ex-pat life, soon gives way to a raw forum where Catherine shares intimate details about her relationship, discontents, and most impulsive desires—a daily soap opera starring herself, her lover (Mr. Frog), and their daughter (Tadpole).

When a faithful reader (who happens to be an attractive, charismatic Englishman) tries to get close to the girl behind the blog, the lines between Catherine’s real and virtual personas blur, tempting her to leave Mr. Frog and the life she has worked so hard to construct, in pursuit of l’amour fou. Propelled by her intoxicating alter ego and cheered on by thousands of readers, Catherine’s life spirals to exhilarating highs and dizzying lows as her life and her creation collide head-on and she must somehow make peace with both.

Fizzing with the vitality and allure of Paris itself, Petite Anglaise offers a fresh twist on the classic story of reinvention abroad: how a young woman transforms herself, wielding the power of a mouse.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Sanderson joins the growing list of bloggers whose writing has been adapted from the computer screen to the page. In her first book, she writes about her blog, Petite Anglaise, the journal of a young British woman living in Paris. She reveals the details of her struggling relationship with her long-term boyfriend, Mr. Frog, and the joys and frustrations of raising their toddler daughter, Tadpole. She becomes part of a community of bloggers, and her life is irrevocably changed when she has an affair with a reader. Sanderson depicts an unfamiliar, less-romantic Paris: one of days at the office, walks through the neighborhood park, and trips to the grocery store. Readers won’t miss the clichés and will instead be taken by Sanderson’s poignant, honest portrait of everyday life. Reading such intimate details can seem voyeuristic, but they also make the book hard to put down. --Aleksandra Walker

Review

Praise for Petite Anglaise


"Compulsively readable."
— PW


"[Sanderson's] prose is infectious, and even when things are dire for her character, they're a delight for the reader."
— NPR


“A digital-age fairytale in Paris. Petite Anglaise is light, frank and tremendous fun… Like all good writers, her work simply enables us to appreciate the diversity, possibilities, trials, and beauty of life.”
— Guardian


"Written with the same panache as her popular blog...Petite Anglaise offers a fresh twist on the classic story of reinvention abroad."
—WWD Scoop


“Magnificent … Sanderson has a novelist’s gift for capturing certain eternal situations.”
—Financial Times


“A wonderful read.”
—InStyle


"Readers will be taken by Sanderson's poignant, honest portrait of everyday life [in Paris]...Reading such intimate details can seem voyeuristic but they also make the book hard to put down."
—Booklist


"Her seamless, dramatically paced narrative reads beautifully, and her ear for dialogue is excellent. Evocative descriptions of Paris are an added plus."
—Kirkus


“A winner…Written with breathtaking candor … it’s the story of a love affair—not so much with Mr. Frog, their adorable blonde daughter Tadpole, or even her elusive lover James, but with Paris itself … Like Peter Mayle, she brings France to life on the page.”
—Daily Express


“Petite Anglaise describes daily life in Paris to a T, interspersing bittersweet domestic scenes with an amusing picture of French manners.”
—Conde Nast Traveler

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Spiegel & Grau; First Edition edition (June 17, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385522800
• ISBN-13: 978-0385522809
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,561,896 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I'm a thirty-six year old Brit who has been living in Paris for thirteen years.

I began blogging, anonymously, as "petite anglaise" back in July 2004, writing about life in Paris, about my daughter Tadpole and my partner, Mr Frog. Little did I know when I started blogging that "petite anglaise" was going to turn my life upside down.

A year later I fell in love with one of my blog readers and had to make some difficult decisions. In 2006 I was fired by my employers when they became aware of the existence of my blog. Later that year I signed a book deal to transform my story into a memoir.

These days I'm writing full-time and still madly in love with Paris.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Francophiles beware May 29, 2009

By wordsmith

Format:Kindle Edition

As with others who have expressed disappointment with this book, I have to agree and chime in. I truly wanted to enjoy this story as I am keen on memoir and had once lived in Paris. Despite my predisposition to its premise, I found I couldn't enjoy it as the author comes across as quite narcissistic. So much of the narrative was filtered through what appears to be an endless abyss of insecurity. It made it difficult to relate to let alone find sympathy in her story. For example, she is forever interpreting less than lovely interactions as being done to or as affronts rather than realizing it's her approach and attitude that cause so much inner grief. My opinion of the book was sealed when I found myself repeatedly cringing at the author's descriptions of her toddler daughter. The author exults her romantic life to the detriment of other vital relationships. This book is one dimensional and ultimately a waste of time.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Girl meets blog March 11, 2009

By Nancy S. West

Format:Hardcover

As her memoir opens, Catherine Sanderson has become an unhappy person. She loves her one-year-old daughter but finds motherhood demanding and frustrating. She is discontent in her relationship with her long-time partner. And even Paris, the city in which she's dreamed of living since childhood, is losing its luster for her.

So she finds a new love, ripe to be showered with devotion and attention. Well, she also has an affair. But the real object of Catherine's affection in the memoir Petite Anglaise is not "Jim from Rennes," who becomes her new boyfriend, but rather her blog, also called Petite Anglaise. Indeed, on a dull afternoon when her various sources of malcontent seem insurmountable, Catherine opens a page on her computer and starts writing. And then hits "publish," and a relationship is born.

This is the first memoir I've read about a girl and her blog. (The memoir "Julie and Julia" by Julie Powell stemmed from a blog, but the author makes only passing mention of it in the narrative, whereas for Sanderson it is a key player in her life.) At first, the blog is a creative outlet and an escape, but it gradually takes on the role of savior. Through her blog, she not only vents her feelings but also experiments a little bit. Like a lot of people, Catherine is a little more clever, a little sassier, a little more adventuresome in her writing than in her real life. Although she initially believes Petite Anglaise is merely a reflection of herself, she eventually comes to recognize that it is more, and as her life develops in new directions - she makes new friends through the blog, breaks up with her partner, and starts an affair with a reader - she gradually begins to question whether she is living through her character, whether her character is controlling her, or just what the releationship between the two -- the real Catherine Sanderson and the blog persona - might be.

Artists have explored the relationships between themselves and their creations ever since the myth of Pygmalion, and the fact that Sanderson uses the state-of-the-art social media to do it doesn't make this an entirely new story, but as blogging and other forms of social media such as Facebook becomes epidemic, it's interesting to think about who we are in relation to our screen selves. Sanderson isn't a fascinating or even always likable person, but she's willing to admit that, both to her memoir readers and to readers of her blog. She struggles with her decisions, and for every time she second-guesses herself, most notably when she breaks up with her daughter's father, she has dozens of blog readers chiming in with their own opinions in the "comments" section of her blog. The unexamined life may not be worth living, as Socrates said; the overexamined life, brought to us by Netscape, presents a whole other set of challenges.

Beyond the questions of blogging and self-reflection, Sanderson simply has an interesting story to tell about life as an ex-pat and young mother in Paris. She loves the city but struggles with its limitations - the daycare situation, the difficulty of finding a suitable apartment, even the dingy appearance of the city of light in late winter - and this memoir is enlightening for those aspects as well as the ones related to social media. Sanderson isn't always a terrific writer, and her romantic scenes border on the Harlequin-esque, but possibly that's the point, to some extent. She's not a great writer but we like reading about her anyway, because she's so candid and so real. And that may be the beauty of blogging.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Readable but inconsequential October 24, 2008

By Passante

Format:Hardcover

This is a beach or airplane read. The author can be witty and she is at her best when she writes about everyday experiences in Paris, but too often her obsession with self and her tendency to take herself way too seriously get in the way. Sanderson's blog, especially the early entries, offers more of the light and entertaining anecdotal writing she is best at.