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Many years ago, Mr. Buford, a magazine columnist, went to Italy to learn how to cook in a restaurant (a very different endeavor than cooking for the family). He wrote a book about this experience, and the pleasure he took in living in Italy, getting to know the culture, learning the language and the food and wine of the area shone through on every page.

He came back to the U.S., married, and shortly after his wife bore twins decided to repeat this experience en famille in France. Most of the details of actually moving a family of young children to France falls to his wife, while he pursues the dream of working in an upscale French restaurant. Although he is in every way unqualified for this duty, he relies upon a few connections and the modest celebrity he achieved with his first book to land in a famous cooking school, which he leaves after a few weeks, then in a famous restaurant.

He doesn't enjoy his work. He really, really dislikes his coworkers, and they look down on him as an unqualified, privileged wanker. He wishes he were still in Italy, where working in the kitchen is a duty of pleasure rather than a hypercompetitive effort to determine who is the top dog. 40% of the way through this, I can only conclude that he really hated being in France, and didn't have any fun at all writing this book, either. For the reader, it's like being stuck as a guest in somebody's home while they have a marital tiff. You just want it to end.

Early in the book, he works at a (relatively) humble bakery, making bread, and this is the only part of the book I enjoyed. I did not feel compelled to finish it.