I am about 3/4 of the way through Gourmet Rhapsody and am not sure I will finish. Although I loved The Elegance of the Hedgehog, this one is more difficult for me to get through, but it could be the format. Like others, I have difficulty keeping focused on the audiobook and find myself missing large portions. If I were reading this, I might enjoy it more. The language is lovely but the readers can be annoying. I might have more sympathy and like the characters more if I didn't dislike the various voices as much. I may have to switch over to a real book to fully appreciate this one.

Gourmet Rhapsody takes place in the same affluent apartment building as The Elegance of the Hedgehog. This book, however, revolves around an elderly food critic, Monsieur Arthens, who is on his deathbed. The story flip flops between the food critic desperately trying to remember a specific food or taste while he revisits old memories of his lifetime. The rest of the story is narrated by the various people in his life: wife, cat, children, etc. Some of them liked him and some absolutely loathe him. (Almost every section of the audio book is narrated by someone else with a lot of flashbacks.)

At first I did NOT like the food critic. Pompous. Vain. Wordy. But as I sat and knitted, I just started to salivate. I wanted to curl up with a glass of wine and listen to all the foods. (My husband just laughed at that because I am not what you'd call a foodie person.) And then I started to like ol' Monsieur Arthens. He's just on his deathbed remembering fond tastes and smells and experiences while all around him family and friends are judging him.

Anyway, there you have it. I did like it. I want to re-read it (not listen) because there are so many things said that I loved. No dog-earring with audio copies. ( )

I didn't finish this; I tried listening to it but kept getting distracted and found that it just didn't hold my attention. The book seemed well-suited to the audio format because it has long stretches of 1st person narration by one character at a time but if you can't concentrate on audio content like me it's going to be hard to get anything out of the audio version. I'd be interested to read the paperback but I think I'm just not an audiobook person. ( )

I loved this audiobook! Disclosure: I received the audiobook through LibraryThing in exchange for a review. I listen to a lot of audiobooks and find some narrators to be much better than others. I loved that this story was read by several different narrators. Each narrator seemed perfect for the part(s) he or she read. I also love good food, and the way the main character, restaurant critic Monsieur Pierre Arthens, described fish in the section where he reminisced about grilled sardines made my mouth water. "...To say that the flesh is delicate, that its taste is both subtle and expansive, that it stimulates the gums with a mixture of sharpness and sweetness; to say that the combination of the grilled skin's faint bitterness and the extreme smoothness of the firm, strong, harmonious flesh, filling one's mouth with a flavor from elsewhere, elevates the grilled sardine to the rank of culinary apotheosis, is at best like evoking the soporific virtues of opium. For what is at issue here is neither how delicate or sweet or strong or smooth the grilled sardine may be, but its wild nature...." Each food was described brilliantly: meat, fish, vegetables, sushi and other raw foods, bread, dairy, toast, whiskey, ice cream, mayonnaise.

Though beautiful descriptions of food are a big part of this book, the characters that surround Pierre are also wonderfully portrayed. There are fifteen distinct characters, including the cold-hearted Pierre, his wife with whom he has a strange/strained relationship, his confused daughter, a loyal housekeeper, a nephew or two, Rick the Cat and others. This is a very short book (four discs/156 pages), but Barbery manages to create well-drawn characters with their monologues.

I have not read Barbery's more popular book, "The Elegance of the Hedgehog," in which Monsieur Arthens makes his debut, but I plan to read it soon. ( )

At least half of all of my reading is done through audio books, and this one is well done. Having multiple people to voice the characters helps keep conversations straight.

The book revolves around Pierre Arthens, a food critic, who is on his death bed and desperately trying to recall a specific meal. It's told mainly through memories and through various characters' points of view.

The descriptions of the food can be a bit overwhelming to those of us who aren't regular cooks, but they are interesting. The book is an enjoyable look at a man who loved food and himself, but never really connects with the people around him. ( )