TITLE: A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected RomanceAUTHOR: Marlena Di Blasi
STARTED: February 7, 2009
FINISHED: February 11, 2009
PAGES: 304
GENRE: Memoir
FIRST SENTENCE: The small room is filled with German tourists, a few English, and a table or two of locals.
SUMMARY: [From barnesandnoble.com] He saw her across the Piazza San Marco and fell in love from afar. When he sees her again in a Venice café a year later, he knows it is fate. He knows little English; and she, a divorced American chef, speaks only food-based Italian. Marlena thinks she is incapable of intimacy, that her heart has lost its capacity for romantic love. But within months of their first meeting, she has packed up her house in St. Louis to marry Fernando—“the stranger,” as she calls him—and live in that achingly lovely city in which they met.
Vibrant but vaguely baffled by this bold move, Marlena is overwhelmed by the sheer foreignness of her new home, its rituals and customs. But there are delicious moments when Venice opens up its arms to Marlena. She cooks an American feast of Mississippi caviar, cornbread, and fried onions for the locals . . . and takes the tango she learned in the Poughkeepsie middle school gym to a candlelit trattoría near the Rialto Bridge. All the while, she and Fernando, two disparate souls, build an extraordinary life of passion and possibility.
Featuring Marlena’s own incredible recipes, A Thousand Days in Venice is the enchanting true story of a woman who opens her heart—and falls in love with both a man and a city.
THOUGHTS: Di Blasi has written her sweet (I mean that in every way possible) story in vivid and emotional language. I can't say I would up and marry a man who only saw me in profile, but its this utterly romantic feeling which makes the book highly enjoyable.
Curiously, Di Blasi rarely uses name in her text. In some ways, that makes the story seem more like a fairy tale than a second-chance romance. Di Blasi's paramore is first The Stranger and then My Husband. Even in the rough patches of their life together, there is romance. It's enviable. This romance is a first for The Stranger but is Di Blasi's second marriage. They are an older couple, well-established in their own lives and their romantic bliss turns everything upside down. I find it utterly fascinating that two people could meet and marry like this couple. It truly is a fairy tale.
The language of this text is decadent. Dear god - I wanted to eat every morsel of food that is described in this book. What is it about books set in Italy that make me want to quit my job and just eat all day? It must be the sun. It makes the food look shinier and, therefore, more delicious. I should not read books that describe food in mouthwatering detail before bed. It makes my mouth water, my tummy rumble, and my dreams turn to smorgasbords of delectable bites.
[Random note: I typed smorgasbord wrong and spell check turned it into orgasm. Sounds about right.]
RATING: 7/10 [Very Good]
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