After New York City emptied out in March 2020, Glynnis MacNicol, aged forty-six, unmarried with no children, spent sixteen months alone in her tiny Manhattan apartment. When the opportunity to sublet a friend's apartment in Paris arose, MacNicol jumped on it. What follows is a joyful, unexpected journey into one woman's pursuit of radical enjoyment.
Absorbing ... Steamy as it may be, MacNicol’s sexual odyssey serves as a smoke screen — at times entertaining, at others oddly tedious, at yet others nerve-racking ... She employs a harder, cooler tone and style, scaffolded with a tinge of defensiveness, as if anticipating the judgment of prudish readers who clutch pearls to their necks as they gape in horror at her flouting of convention ... Her distrust of — and disdain for — the reader often threatens to undermine her sharp observations and analyses, not to mention narrative momentum. Still, the force of MacNicol’s elegant prose presides, alongside her uncompromising intellect. The novelistic approach to scene and character that animated her first book is largely a delight.
One pleasure for the reader is her casual style of writing, which seems to mimic the pace of life ... he digressions feel neither self conscious nor literary but relaxed, implying that one source of a single woman’s pleasure is having the time to follow the flow of her own thoughts.
Entertaining ... MacNicol emerges as a relatable raconteur, blending in literary and historic references while vividly recreating scenes, menus, and sexual encounters with satisfying detail.
