Black Girl in Paris

Rating:
Summary: Black Girl went to Paris
Review: Captivating and mystifying. I had never heard of Shay Youngblood before Black Girl In Paris, but I have certainly put the word out in the form of "gifts". I went to Paris not in pursuit of anyone's legacy, but after reading the book I was moved to revisit the place of faceless color. I am now a fan of Ms. Youngblood and she has inspired me to keep pursuing my aspiration to become a writer...

Boston, MA

Rating:
Summary: Black Girl went to Paris
Review: Captivating and mystifying. I had never heard of Shay Youngblood before Black Girl In Paris, but I have certainly put the word out in the form of "gifts". I went to Paris not in pursuit of anyone's legacy, but after reading the book I was moved to revisit the place of faceless color. I am now a fan of Ms. Youngblood and she has inspired me to keep pursuing my aspiration to become a writer...

Boston, MA

Rating:
Summary: Worth the Trip
Review: I truly enjoyed this book. But woe betide an author who dares to tread on the sacred ground of the Black Expatriate Experience in Paris! How dare she see the same sights and drink at the same cafes in your search for her own experience. The nay-sayers who have phoned in their caustic remarks about this lovely book have completely missed the point. This is not about Baldwin or Wright. They came before. Eden came after. This book addresses the strange relationship one can have to a Black History lived by someone else somewhere else. A strange relationship to your own dreams when those dreams are filtered through the experience of others. Eden comes to appreciate and understand her unique relationship to Paris partly as a result of seeking out what was cliche about it, what was presented to her as "the real Paris" and finding out how little that meant. The impression I got from Eden at the books close is radically different than the expectations she had at its beginning. Anyhow. Decide for yourself. I'm eager to see more work from this talented writer, who dares to stray off the beaten path where "Sista gurl" writers and the Negro Intellectual Elite walk their tired talk.

Rating:
Summary: Awful
Review: I'm experiencing this book as an unabridged audio recording. There are 5 two-sided cassettes and I'm half way through side 2 of cassette 5. I wanted to give it 0 stars, but didn't have that option. What a jumbled mess and a waste of my time. I must like punishment because I keep thinking that maybe it'll get better at the end--I'm almost at the end and it hasn't gotten better!! This story doesn't really have any logical flow to it. It's all over the place. Some of the connections make no sense whatsoever, especially the part where she talks about her "experience" washing between the old poet's legs. I think we as readers could and should have been spared that description. Thank God for libraries or I would have been highly ticked off if I had paid for this mess and would have demanded a refund!
This book was recommended for those who had read "Blues Dancing" by Dianne McKinney-Whetstone. These two books should NOT be in the same category. Ms. McKinney-Whetstone is in a category by herself; one in which Ms. Youngblood does not belong. Ms. McKinney-Whetstone MAKES you want to read and keep turning the pages to find out what happens next. Ms. Youngblood makes you want to do the opposite.
I hope her other book is better because this book was not a good example/showcase of her talent. I would not recommend this book to anyone because they would immediately want to stop reading period.

Rating:
Summary: I Too Was A Black Girl In Paris
Review: Oh, such delicious prose --language to levitate and float on.
However unrealistic Eden's adventures may seem from a practical point her travels and encounters are just that - adventures. The chance taking in the novel does not reflect something that a thirty - something traveler with kids would do but
a twenty-something dreamer would definitely take the shot.
Shay Youngblood's book was a wonderful journey to world of innocence,danger,wonder and excitement. A place where anything is possible and if you believe deeply enough you just may find Baldwin on a Paris street corner. Read it and enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: France seen through a very special eye
Review: Shay Youngblood's book is a great novel for anyone who has walked the streets of Paris looking not only at the layers of beauty but also at the layers of humanity. The need to create consumes the character to areas that open with each passing opportunity. Well done. Now to read her previous book.

Rating:
Summary: A dream, or a joke?
Review: This short novel by Shay Youngblood, is told in the first person. It is a story of a young black woman, who, at 26, decides to go to Paris to become a writer. She's enamored with the stories of other successful black writers who have done this, such as James Baldwin and Langston Hughes, and wants to follow in their footsteps. It's 1986, and there are random bombings in Paris because of the Algeria situation but this never comes across either as a reality or as a metaphor. What does come across is her loneliness as she encounters one misadventure after another. She's penniless, but gets jobs as an au pair, an artist's model and a caregiver of an elderly lady. Along the way she meets some interesting people and even has a love affair or two. She is always aware of prejudice and the realities of living on her own.

I found the book a pleasant read but there is not much focus to it. The plot follows her adventures or misadventures and the characters come and go. It rambled too much for my taste and, and even though I learned a bit about her experience as an expatriate, I found the story too one-dimensional and soon got bored.

Rating:
Summary: Little focus and much too one-dimensional
Review: This short novel by Shay Youngblood, is told in the first person. It is a story of a young black woman, who, at 26, decides to go to Paris to become a writer. She's enamored with the stories of other successful black writers who have done this, such as James Baldwin and Langston Hughes, and wants to follow in their footsteps. It's 1986, and there are random bombings in Paris because of the Algeria situation but this never comes across either as a reality or as a metaphor. What does come across is her loneliness as she encounters one misadventure after another. She's penniless, but gets jobs as an au pair, an artist's model and a caregiver of an elderly lady. Along the way she meets some interesting people and even has a love affair or two. She is always aware of prejudice and the realities of living on her own.

I found the book a pleasant read but there is not much focus to it. The plot follows her adventures or misadventures and the characters come and go. It rambled too much for my taste and, and even though I learned a bit about her experience as an expatriate, I found the story too one-dimensional and soon got bored.

Rating:
Summary: Props to Sisters Overseas
Review: This was a nice, Saturday afternoon on the beach read...not too deep to stir up the emotions and not too light that it wasn't worth reading. I liked the idea behind the story and the way it romanticized black folks living and succeeding overseas and how a striving artist of today wants to recreate that vitality. Her hardships and conflicts contributed nicely to the story, but occasionally they lacked depth. From time to time I wanted another chapter on certain characters and certain relationships.

Her writing is very good in delivering plot, but I wanted to know more about the characters and what moved them. I wasn't looking to completely understand everyone, but I also didn't want to still be "hungry after the meal". Read this one for fun and entertainment -- you have a good time.

Rating:
Summary: A Lovely Read for a Summer Day
Review: When I first cracked this book open, I was seated in the back of a minivan with a boring 4 hour ride to my next gig. I just picked this book up to keep myself busy. Instead, what happened I can hardly explain. I found myself captured by the main character's world, exploring my life lessons, as she described in detail her trek through life in Paris. Although I am brown, I am not African-American, but many of the translucent realities of color's impact on experience hit home. In addition, the challenge of balancing the need to make ends meet with the intense desire to bite into every rich experience and note down what we feel in a journal to write formally later on... well, many of us face that difficulty everyday. We all have a need to create and leave behind some mark of immortality. We also have the burden of coin, which keeps us fed and housed. But what if, like the main character, we could just free-fall and try something different? Living adventurously and not knowing the ending to our stories is what gives texture, color and flavor to our lives, and this emulation through vivid storytelling, as penned by Shay Youngblood is the reason why this has gone on my shelf from fiction to guidebook.