Julia Child was born in Pasadena, California. She graduated from
Smith College and worked for the OSS during World War II; afterward
she lived in Paris, studied at the Cordon Bleu, and taught cooking
with Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, with whom she wrote the
first volume of Mastering the Art of French
Cooking (1961). In 1963, Boston’s WGBH launched The
French Chef television series, which made Julia Child a
national celebrity, earning her the Peabody Award in 1965 and an
Emmy in 1966. Several public television shows and numerous
cookbooks followed. She died in 2004.
Alex Prud'homme is Julia Child's great-nephew and the coauthor
of her autobiography, My Life in France, which was
adapted into the movie Julie & Julia. He is also the author
of The Ripple Effect: The Fate of Freshwater in the
Twenty-First Century, Hydrofracking: What Everyone Needs to
Know, and The Cell Game, and he is the coauthor
(with Michael Cherkasky) of Forewarned: Why the Government Is
Failing to Protect Us--and What We Must Do to Protect Ourselves.
Prud'homme's journalism has appeared in The New York Times,
The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Time, and People.
“A delight.” —The New York Times
“What a joy!” —The Washington Post
“Endlessly engaging.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Inspiring.” —Entertainment Weekly
“Delighful and ebulliently written. . . . Her joy just about jumps
off the books pages.” —Christian Science Monitor
“Lively, infectious. . . . Her elegant but unfussy prose pulls the
reader into her stories.” —Chicago Sun-Times
“Captivating. . . . Her marvelously distinctive voice is present on
every page.” —San Francisco Chronicle
With Julia Child's death in 2004 at age 91, her grandnephew Prud'homme (The Cell Game) completed this playful memoir of the famous chef's first, formative sojourn in France with her new husband, Paul Child, in 1949. The couple met during WWII in Ceylon, working for the OSS, and soon after moved to Paris, where Paul worked for the U.S. Information Service. Child describes herself as a "rather loud and unserious Californian," 36, six-foot-two and without a word of French, while Paul was 10 years older, an urbane, well-traveled Bostonian. Startled to find the French amenable and the food delicious, Child enrolled at the Cordon Bleu and toiled with increasing zeal under the rigorous tutelage of eminence grise Chef Bugnard. "Jackdaw Julie," as Paul called her, collected every manner of culinary tool and perfected the recipes in her little kitchen on rue de l'Universite ("Roo de Loo"). She went on to start an informal school with sister gourmandes Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, who were already at work on a French cookbook for American readers, although it took Child's know-how to transform the tome-after nine years, many title changes and three publishers-into the bestselling Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961). This is a valuable record of gorgeous meals in bygone Parisian restaurants, and the secret arts of a culinary genius. Photos. First serial in the New York Times Magazine and Bon Appetit. (Apr.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
"A delight." -The New York Times
"What a joy!" -The Washington Post
"Endlessly engaging." -The Philadelphia Inquirer
"Inspiring." -Entertainment Weekly
"Delighful and ebulliently written. . . . Her joy just
about jumps off the books pages." -Christian Science Monitor
"Lively, infectious. . . . Her elegant but unfussy prose
pulls the reader into her stories." -Chicago Sun-Times
"Captivating. . . . Her marvelously distinctive voice is
present on every page." -San Francisco Chronicle
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