Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I enjoyed this book tremendously and found the chapters on skin care and makeup especially interesting to me personally. The author comes across as honest and candid about her feelings regarding her experience with French culture. Several things she says have also been discussed in Mireille Giuliano's books, so there is consistency. However, I could not help but think about how much easier it would be for Americans to have a better work-life balance if so many people I know didn't have to work overloaded jobs at 50 and 60 hours a week to keep from getting laid off, plus deal with 2-hour daily commutes, and bosses who complain vigorously if a person leaves one's desk for anything more than a trip to the restroom or the company microwave to warm a frozen lunch, never mind a refreshing lunchtime walk. This is why we have gyms and home exercise videos, to replace what the French people get naturally in the course of a day's business. Also, it would be easy to turn out beautiful, gourmet meals and have an uncluttered house if the working women I know only had to work part-time like the lady of the house for the French host family of the author. The habit of the Frenchmen to pick up after themselves is a big help to the uncluttered look of a house, as well. How gallant of them. The big secret of the French weight control seems to be lots and lots of walking and stair climbing. We're just not set up for that. Things here are laid out in a spacious manner conducive to driving and many, many areas, both commercial and residential, are too dangerous to walk in, whether because of pit bulls, no sidewalks, or demographics. The neighborhoods compact enough to walk in for any food marketing are generally older, and simply not safe. These are also the areas being referred to now as "food deserts". I have just read that French workers receive 30 mandated vacation days per year, plus 10 holidays. When was the last time the majority of U.S. workers you know took any more than a total of 10 business days in a year's time -- and maybe not even that if there have been layoffs in the company, so now extra work is piled on an already overloaded job. A wonderful book about the French lifestyle, and a sad commentary on ours.