Customer Reviews

A Thousand Days in Venice (Ballantine Reader's Circle)

5 star:		(54)
4 star:		(25)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Details, the essence of domesticity, shine in this story. There are the travelogue-esque descriptions of Venice: Napoleon's observation about Piazza San Marco and viewing works of art sequestered in ancient churches. There's a discussion of making house, once in the Midwest in a little house I would love to see and again in the grotty chaos of a bachelor's digs. And throughout are delicious descriptions of food and drink and the ways and places to enjoy them.

Like youth, this book may be somewhat wasted on the young. The small ruminations, the reflections on how we find a place and make a place in life may seem over-wrought. Until the onset of my own middle-age, I felt the same way about such memoirs. Now, I greet writings like this with a mixture of recognition and enthusiasm: recognition of the silly ways we fumble along and enthusiasm for another's discovery that it is not too late to savour what is delicious about life. In that, I find a parable of encouragement.

I have spent the last two nights in Venice... not really, but I feel as though I have, lying in bed amidst fluffy pillows, with a glass of red wine and my hot-off-the-presses copy of A Thousand Nights in Venice. What delightful book it is, Marlena takes us all on a romantic journey into the unknown. What happens when you meet the love of your life in, um, for lack of a better term -- middle age? How do you pick up and move across the world to an unknown place and cast your lot with a charming stranger? So many of us have had this fantasy while traveling, Marlena had the courage to act on the opportunity when it appeared. She has a lovely way with words, her descriptions of people, places, and best of all -- food, will sweep readers into an exotic world. Enjoy!

I hate to be a dissenting opinion, but the other side of the coin ought to be revealed. I was puzzled with this story because it seemed to me that the author up and moved to Venice to marry a man she knew (barely) peripherally. It wasn't like they'd had a long distance romance for years...and then decided to marry. They met, visited each other a couple times. Then once she's living with him, she is frustrated with the adjustment and his foreign (to her) ways and continues to call him "the stranger" even after they are married! It seemed too whimsical and I couldn't really feel bad for her frustrations given that she went into this pretty blindly. What did interest me was her in depth knowledge of Venice itself, which I'm sure she could've delved deeper into and provided us with more tidbits the average tourist wouldn't uncover. I also appreciated her detail of the Italian culture (ie: wedding plans, renovating the house, the moving process). I won't say I wouldn't recommend the book because I do feel there's an audience for it, I just won't be giving my copy out freely and endorsing it as the read of the summer.

I have read many books set in Venice, but this is by far the best of any, whether fiction or non-fiction. The author really captures Venice and the Venetian people perfectly, sparing no-one, not even her husband, when she points out their quirks and idiosyncracies. The story is touching, funny, and true, and as soon as I finished I started reading it again. I will never forget about the Southern American dinner the author cooks for a big party of Venetians or the tango she does with the tax-man, I felt like I was there eating fudge pudding with a bunch of old Venetian guys. I feel I know Marlena and Fernando and having lived in Venice for a while myself, I could totally relate to the ups and downs of Marlena's life there with her Venetian.

I've read the on-line debate about this book with pleasure. I understand the conflict, but I come down on the side that says this book is a great read.

I readily agree with those who say the descriptions can be too long and too colorful, and, especially those who say that they could not imagine moving to Venice to marry a "stranger." But, when I finished this book I felt I had spent the last few evenings with a highly entertaining, charming, and impulsive friend. That we had spent the visit talking about life, love, food, and Venice. And, that I wished she could have stayed longer. Not that I wanted to live like her, or agreed with all her decisions, but that listening to her talk was simply fascinating.

I loved the description of small things about Venice, her admission that all in love is not perfect, and her determined, wily temperment.

Take this book to the beach. Use it to spice up a dull week. Read about this woman's flight of fancy. Don't judge her life choices based on practicality or her word choices based on Hemingway. Just relax and enjoy.

This book was our August Book club selection. The club was split on liking it and hating it, it certainly gave a good discussion. Personally I liked it. Though I was just in venice a week before reading it, so perhaps I was biased. Marlena did acurately portray Venice as to the locations and sights in the book matching real life, but she left a lot of questions in peoples minds, such as she answered What and where a lot, but never a why, as in Why did she fall for peter sellers fernando? why did she move why were they leaving why why why.. though she is a cook, we did like her descriptions of things using food ajectives, but it needed to be mixed up a bit, we all got really tired of the term Blueberry eyes.. the recipes in the end are amazing.

So I guess in summary, I'd reccomend A Thousand Days in Venice, if you have been, or ever plan to go there. otherwise, you might want to make a different selection.

Eric

A Thousand Days in Venice is proof that it's never too late to live a dream. The story has a fairy tale quality, yet it really happened: Marlena de Blasi, a chef who is at a bit of a loose end in her life meets a Venetian bank clerk who had observed her before on one of her previous trips to Venice and fallen in love. Throwing caution to the winds, (as she says, "There hasn't been a prudent decision in this story."), de Blasi gives in to her love-at-first-sight response to the "blueberry-eyed stranger" and follows her heart where it leads her. Dispersing her home and possessions in the States, she packs up and moves to Venice to be with Fernando. Their romance and courtship against the backdrop of one of the most romantic places on earth is enchantingly and sensuously told. De Blasi is a master at evoking in word pictures the sights, and scents, textures, and sounds of La Sererenissima.
The adustments, compromises, and mutual discoveries that romance and a new marriage bring into the lives of Marlena and Fernando are related with humor and a sense of wonder at the changes brought about by this unexpected later life event. True to her her passion for cooking, foods and recipes play a part in de Blasi's story. Best of all, she ends her book with a selection of recipes that play a role in her romance so that the reader may extend the enchantment into the kitchen.

In A Thousand Days in Venice, author Marlena de Blasi portrays herself as the woman that Italian banker Fernando falls passionately in love with at first sight, the woman that everyone in Venice seems to be enchanted with, the American that complete strangers all over Italy are charmed by. De Blasi takes risks as a writer and as a woman. The story is not quite believable, but somehow she pulls it off.

By concentrating on the attractions and food of Venice, and by sticking to the unfolding of an unlikely love affair, de Blasi makes A Thousand Days in Venice an enjoyable story. It isn't very long before you stop thinking about how eccentric de Blasi must be in real life and just lose yourself in the romance of Venice.

There was just enough conflict here to keep A Thousand Days from being a soppy travelog. All of de Blasi's friends are convinced that she is making a dreadful mistake by giving up her house and job in Saint Louis (as she insists on spelling it) and moving to Venice to marry a man she had met only months before. Then as she gets to know Fernando better, she finds he has certain ideas about how she should dress, conduct herself, and speak. Will the romance survive the doubts and the clash of cultures?

Of course it does, and after the couple exhausts Venice with their exuberance, they move on to Tuscany to start a new life, and a new book.

but that is also about Love! I hate traditional romances with beautiful and perfect main characters. Marlena's book is different. She follows a skinny-legged man who falls in love with her at first sight. She falls in love with him, but she also falls in love with Venice. She transports the reader into another world, made of water, colour, light, and... food. It's an unusual book full of humour and wisdom about relationships, as well as a celebration of the senses. I would recommend it to anyone who likes food, wine, love, Italy and Venice.

This a wonderful book. It is a captivating love story. It is also a wonderful lesson on the reality of following dreams, including the reality and frustrations of trying to live in, an adapt to, a world that you have grown to love from travel and vacations. DeBlasi's writing is lyrical. We get caught up in the romance and yet stay firmly in touch with reality as we learn of the trials, tribulations, joy and wonder of picking up your life to follow a dream. Highly recommended!