44 Charles Street: A Novel

I discovered this book when I was recently reading an old magazine of mine.  This book ran a whole page ad in this magazine and it caught my attention. So for all the authors out there, promoting a book on a magazine ads still helps even in this day and age when social media rule.

My Thought On Chapter One:  This book began with the problems of a 35-year old Francesca who was dealing with a broken relationship, a leaky house and a failing art gallery. How common do women have problems in our career, our finances, our home and our relationship all at the same time?  I think it's pretty common.   

My Thought On Chapter Two:  So Francesca's mother was actually a Countess in Italy because her last dead husband was a count.  She married and divorced multiple times and got rich along the way.  Francesca's father was a famous and accomplished artist who made lots of money by painting. He was married to Avery, who was a wealthy and successful attorney. While I relate to Francesca's problems, I just wish I had wealthy and well-connected parents and step-mom to help me solve my problems like Francesca did.  So, Francesa's well-connected step-mom would help her sell her father's paintings that were gifted to Francesca for a lot of money, and then her wealthy artist father would invest in her failing gallery so she could buy out her ex-boyfriend's partnership.  Francesca's problems that burdened her so much in Chapter One seemed to be all of a sudden,  solved at lunch with her dad in this quaint French restaurant in Manhattan called "La Goulue" . What this Chapter surprised me was that  the food Francesca ordered from such a quaint French restaurant was actually just "crab salad", and her father had the "French onion-soup" with "French green beans".  These didn't sound like special French food to me.  No, if I had a chance to dine in this restaurant, I wouldn't order these items which I could easily have in my local cheap diner.  I would order something that my cheap local diner doesn't have. I guess Francesca inherited her simple taste from her dad.    

My Thought On Chapter Three: This chapter gave me a tour of Francesca's five-story house in downtown Manhattan.  She was going to rent her house out to 3 roommates. I wish I had a house like that in New York City.  From the description of it, it sounded like a great house in the city that can be worth millions of dollars.  So, this novel is about the rich girl's problems? It was a best-seller, why? May be because we wish we could have the same problems like the rich?  I however do relate to the sadness when Francesca's boyfriend told her about moving his things out.  I believe that the sad feeling when someone close to us had their things and room emptied out, is what most of us had experienced.

My Thought On Chapter Four: After weeding out a lot of applicants who replied to Francesca's rental ads, she finally found Eileen to be her first tenant.  Eileen moved to New York from Los Angeles because she was running away from her insane stalker boyfriend.  I can't imagine running from Los Angeles to New York city for safety?  Like there is no pyscho and criminal in NYC?  Francesca previously rejected 4 lesbian couples. To me, I would rather share my home with lesbians than a naive girl who has an insane stalker ex-boyfriend. It's because I don't want any roomate who can possibly lead a psycho stalker ex-boyfriend  to my home.   I had not yet heard about a lesbian ax-murderer who murdered an ex.  I just think it's safer to room with a lesbian.  May be I'm prejudiced, I think lesbians often make more money and they make better tenants without bringing home scary and violent boyfriends. This is also the Chapter where Francesca spent her Christmas and New Year's Eve alone, without family or friends. Oh well, any person who has never done that?

My Thought On Chapter Five: Francesca found the rest of her tenants in this Chapter and the group of the main cast was finally complete. One of them was the divorced single-father and graphic designer Chris. The other tenant was Marya, the celebrity chef and best-selling cookbooks author.  This is the difference between reading fiction and a memoir non-fiction.  A person can only find a celebrity chef to be a roommate in fictions. I can't imagine Rachael Ray will ever want to rent a room from me even if she becomes a widow. I don't think she will even rent a cottage in Martha Stewart's mansion. What celebrity chef wants to room with people whom they aren't close to, let alone regular strangers?

My Thought on Chapter Six:  I can't relate to Francesca's 25-year old tenant Eileen. She had a habit of checking her email on the laptop that Francesca left in the kitchen. Who used a rommate's laptop to check email? Who doesn't have a laptop or smart phone to do that?  I never felt comfortable checking my email on any device that isn't mind. So I never did it. Emails at work was an exception. It bugged me so much whenevevr I read Eileen checked her email on Francesca's laptop that I went to check the publication date of this book. It was published in 2012. Well, I remember 2012. Everybody was pretty much texting and emailing on a smart phone.  May be this story was written long time ago before the publication date? This Chapter made me crave for some gingersnaps cookies because Marya baked up a batch of "wafer-thin" heart shape gingerbread cookies.   So, I found a great recipe on Saveur.

To make space on my cluttered bookshelf, I'm now giving away a bunch of books and magazines that I had finished reading. They are like new in condition. Feel free to check them out before you go to Amazon to spend your money on them.