"The Book of Eating," by Adam Platt

Again with the restaurant memoirs, you might be thinking! Longtime readers of this blog know that I love restaurants and I love restaurant memoirs. I have read at least a couple of dozen of these over the years, starting with the late Anthony Bourdain’s notorious and wildly popular “Kitchen Confidential,” and most recently our own San Francisco chef Dominique Crenn’s “Rebel Chef” and New York’s David Chang’s “Eat a Peach.” In between, the food world memoirs I have read include those by Bianca Bosker, Frank Bruni, Phoebe Damrosch, Betty Fussell, Gabrielle Hamilton, David Kamp, Danny Meyer, Ruth Reichl, Eric Ripert, Marcus Samuelsson, and Kim Severson. I just finished restaurant critic Adam Platt’s “The Book of Eating” (Ecco, 2019). For many years I have subscribed to New York Magazine, and read Platt’s restaurant column there. Although I do not live in New York, I enjoy keeping up a bit with the restaurant scene there. And I have always liked Platt’s down-to-earth persona and style in his reviews and articles. This memoir completely comports with his magazine pieces. In addition, I was fascinated with his stories of his upbringing in Asia (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, China) as the son of a U.S. diplomat. Most of his stories of those days, besides showing a very happy family, are about his family’s eating adventures in those countries, sometimes with the whole family and sometimes with his two brothers roaming the cities and trying every kind of food available. Perhaps one reason for my being so intrigued by these stories was the way they resonated with my own upbringing in Asia, in my case in South India. As I started thinking about this connection, food memories came to life, and I became quite nostalgic. In my case some of the foods were basmati rice, biryani, pilau, all kinds of curries, dosa, idli, mulligatawny, papadams, patchidi, perigoo, chaat, pulaharam, guavas, mangos, custard apples, saportas, and more. I remember feasts with food served on stitched together waxy palm leaves. I remember vacations on the beach when we would buy fish straight from the returning fisherman and cook them immediately. I remember going with my friends to the bazaar near our boarding school in the Palni Hills and eating all kinds of food, and drinking tea tossed in the air between two containers. I also, more mundanely but also pleasurably, remember “food parcels” from Canada, including American goodies of various sorts, especially candy bars. Back to Platt’s memoir: He writes of his various jobs as a journalist, his travels, and his gradual focus on becoming a restaurant reviewer/critic. He tells some amusing stories about the process of reviewing, as well as about various people in the food world, some very famous, with whom he interacted along the way. He obviously loves his work. But not all of being a critic is exciting and glamorous; he also tells of eating hundreds of mediocre meals in cookie-cutter restaurants, and of dealing with much criticism of his criticism. He also tells of how things have changed since everyone can now be a critic on the Internet, on Eater and such sites, as well as on Yelp. Readership of newspapers and magazines is dwindling (alas!) and there are fewer and fewer print food writers. Platt also struggles with his weight, and writes about various diets he has been on. A throughline in the memoir is his loved and loving family of origin (fun fact, by the way: one of his brothers is the actor Oliver Platt) and his own equally loving family of his wife and two daughters. Some endearingly candid photos are included. Because some of the chapters are revised versions of already-published pieces, there is some (very minor) repetition from one chapter to another. And there are a couple of sections that drag just a bit. But overall, this is a thoroughly enjoyable memoir by a writer who is companionable, down-to-earth, wry and funny, and a wonderful guide to his adventures and life in the world of food and restaurants.

Celebrating, once again, our wonderful independent bookstores!

I apologize in advance for coming back to a theme I have written about several times before: the importance of supporting independent bookstores. It is just that I feel so strongly about this, and that these stores are endangered by the pandemic. As I have written about a couple of times, most recently on 12/23/20 when I wrote about realizing how many memoirs I had ordered, I have been ordering books online from independent bookstores since the beginning of the pandemic. Pre-pandemic, I either went in person to those same stores, or borrowed books from the library (and donated -- and still donate -- regularly to the Friends of the Library in my town). So I am spending more money than ever on brand new books, but I believe it is more than worth it to give myself this gift during the stay-at-home months, as well as to contribute to the survival and health of these oh-so-important stores. In a recent San Francisco Chronicle article, “Indie Book Shops Have Nurtured Us. It’s Our Turn: We can save them all this winter if we just give them our business,” by Peter Hartlaub (12/20/20), local writers and readers speak of how important these local, well-loved institutions are in our communities. The author tells of writers who sign hundreds of their books especially for their favorite local bookstores, and who ask their readers to buy from independent bookstores; schools that have begun ordering from these independent bookstores; the many customers who attend Zoom readings and other events; and customers and neighbors who have been buying from the stores, and/or making donations. Several writers recall falling in love with books when they were taken regularly to certain bookstores as children. Some speak of the personal attention given, and the deep knowledge of the people who work there. One writer mentions that she often runs into other writers in her favorite local bookstore, intensifying the feeling of community. As the writer Stephen Pastis is quoted in the article: “If you’re not supporting the local bookstores, you will rue the day that bookstore closes. Those people care about the community. They’re another essential part of it.” The reporter reminds us that we can either order from our favorite local bookstores, “or adopt a new one using Indiebound.org, which has a bookstore finder on its home page.” An added pleasure of this article, for me, is that the bookstore featured in the piece, the famous Green Apple, is one I have been going to (or now occasionally ordering deliveries from) since I first arrived in San Francisco, lo these many years ago, and rented an apartment six blocks away from it. I, like many many others, would be devastated if this, or any other of our favorite bookstores, had to close for lack of support from the community of readers. So let’s all keep patronizing these beloved and essential institutions; long live our local independent bookstores!

Three Novels by Rumaan Alam

“Leave the World Behind” (Ecco, 2020), by Rumaan Alam, was one of the “hot” novels (literary division) of 2020. Interest in its strange yet compelling story was enhanced by its exploration of race and class issues, combined with its apocalyptic tone that resonated with our inchoate (and not so inchoate) fears during the plague we are living through. A White couple and their teenaged children rent a vacation home on Long Island, and strange things begin to happen. Then an older Black couple appears at their door, stating that they are the owners of the house, and that something strange has been driving people out of New York City. There is no phone, television, or Internet reception, so no one knows what is happening. The story continues to get stranger, and there are human connections made in the face of the unknown, but always with the undertone of uncertainty about each other. Race and class are present in the interactions, although under the surface. In general I don’t like fiction that in any way approaches science fiction, but this one kept my attention, more for the interpersonal parts than for the mysterious events. I had read reviews of the novel, but before those appeared this year, I didn’t know of this author. So I found and read his two earlier novels. “Rich and Pretty” (2016) tells the story of two close women friends whose lives gradually diverge. I always like the theme of female friendship, and I liked this novel, but it was not memorable. Alam’s second novel, “That Kind of Mother” (2018), is a more complex story, exploring motherhood, race (again), female friendships (again!), adoptions, and more. The story is absorbing and well written. All three of the novels are insightful psychologically. I liked “That Kind of Mother” best of the three, but each of the three made me think and offered an engrossing reading experience. I will definitely watch out for Alam’s next novel.

"Girl, Woman, Other," by Bernardine Evaristo

I read good reviews of the novel “Girl, Woman, Other” (paperback Black Cat, 2019), bought it, hesitated a bit in the face of the slightly unorthodox paragraphing and punctuation, set it aside for a few days, and then was nudged to read it by the strong recommendation of my friend SB. (Thank you, SB!) I was soon overwhelmed by how good this book is, and felt a bit embarrassed and annoyed at myself that I had allowed myself to be, at least temporarily, deterred by a little bit of experimentation in the writing. I soon found that the many short paragraphs, and the dearth of both capital letters and periods, were actually very effective. The novel portrays the lives of several Black British women of different ages, classes, sexualities, and situations. Each section focuses on one or more main characters, but the characters often reappear in future sections as well, thus knitting together a widespread community or network of very different women. I became completely absorbed in this book and its characters, and marveled at the poetic yet down-to-earth writing. The author, Bernardine Evaristo, listed as an “Anglo-Nigerian” writer, was deservedly awarded the prestigious 2019 Booker Prize for this book.

A Box Full of New Memoirs

Yesterday I got a shipment of books that I had ordered from one of my favorite local independent bookstores, the small chain Books, Inc. As I unpacked them, it hit me that seven of the eight books were memoirs; only one was a novel. I hadn’t consciously decided to read more memoirs, although it is true that over the past few years, I have been reading more and more of them. I just never thought I would read more of them than I read novels and short stories; fiction has always been my reading life’s blood. I don’t want to read too much into this one shipment of books, but I do think it is significant. Yes, I have gradually been reading more, but I wonder if the current pandemic and stay-at-home mode has somehow made me turn to “true” stories more than ever. Or perhaps it is simply that more wonderful, compelling memoirs are being published now than ever. In any case, I look forward to reading the books on this lovely pile of brand-new memoirs, and I am sure I will be posting about at least some of them in the weeks to come.

"Seize," by Brian Komei Dempster

My colleague, the poet Brian Komei Dempster, previously wrote the wonderful collection of poems, “Topaz,” which I posted about on 11/26/13. Now I have read his brand-new poetry collection, “Seize” (Four Way Books, 2020), and it is both gripping and moving. The main focus of these poems is the poet’s son Brendan’s severe physical and cognitive disabilities related to epilepsy and other health conditions, and the complicated, serious, sad, challenging, painful but loving experiences that Dempster, his wife Grace, and Brendan have gone through and are still going through in consequence. The details he gives about their daily struggles, so utterly frustrating, are a transcendent sharing of pain and suffering, as well as of deep parental love. Nothing is sugarcoated, and there are no overt “silver linings” presented, but there are small, meaningful victories along the way. Readers are privileged to see the insights and deep connections this family experiences. The poems are candid and wrenching. Dempster also makes connections between his family’s situation with Brendan, on the one hand, and his family of origin’s experiences with discrimination, denigration, and painful suffering because of their Japanese American identities. (The earlier collection, “Topaz,” is named for one of the internment camps during World War II.) Besides writing here about the content and focus of the poems, I want to testify to the beauty and the power of the poems, and the language that simultaneously captures the unique and the universal.

"The Secret Lives of Church Ladies," by Deesha Philyaw

Deesha Philyaw’s small (179 pages) collection of short stories, “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies” (West Virginia University Press) packs a strong punch. First, what a great title! Second, each story individually, and even more the collection as a whole (some of the stories are interconnected), creates a small universe that pulls the reader right in. The focus is on Black girls and women at various ages, in various situations, often to do with love, sex, family, connections, faith, hypocrisy, loss, and grief. And yes, there are many secrets, including forbidden attractions and affairs. There is some (rather grim) humor too, as in the story “Instructions for Married Christian Husbands” who want to have affairs with the narrator; these include practical, non-negotiable guidelines regarding parking, phones, Facebook, religion, health, the man’s wife, and more. In “Peach Cobbler,” a girl writes about her mother’s affair with their church’s pastor. There is “Snowfall,” about women from the South who have trouble with the snow up North; the first line of the story is “Black women aren’t meant to shovel snow.” And poignantly, in the story “When Eddie Levert Comes,” a woman with dementia waits every day for a man she met once years ago, a minor celebrity, to come visit her. Each of these stories shows a writer in complete control, and on every page evokes emotions and insights. This is Philyaw’s debut book of fiction; I look forward to reading more by her in the future.