But there are worse things than being seduced by a river, even if it sometimes leads to a couple of weak-kneed sighs. And this love letter sometimes comes closer to the tone of a guidebook. An entire chapter on the photography of the Seine offers up just one photo. At the same time, the book falls short in places. Although the book was mostly finished before the devastating April fire at Notre Dame, she added a final section that allowed her to conclude this homage to her adopted river, city and country. Sciolino reaches the right elegiac note in her afterword. And Francophiles like me might find themselves collecting ideas for new places to visit. With that attitude in mind, it’s fun to select the morsels, from those that will undoubtedly impress and disgust dinner companions to those that might come in handy in a trivia contest. Master storyteller and longtime New York Times foreign correspondent Elaine Sciolino explores the Seine through its lively charactersa bargewoman, a riverbank bookseller, a houseboat dweller, a famous cinematographerand follows it from the remote plateaus of Burgundy through Paris and to the sea. In fact, it’s clear that this book is meant not to be read in a narrative flow but to be sampled bit by bit, like the delicate macarons that line the shelves of so many patisseries. With this sweeping level of research, the reader has the sense that no tidbit is excluded. In too many spots, though, The Seine reads slightly more like an almanac than a love letter. an extended love letter to the Seine, from its ancient underground source in a 'forgotten corner of Burgundy' to its drab discharge into the English Channel at Le Havre.
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