Would you like some bread with thst Book? ~ Veena Venugopal (12 of 26)

 Thanks to Shobha Mam from CBC for introducing this book in our Culinary Literature discussion "Would you like some bread with that book.".  

• How as a child her mother and she tried making something from  'Ritu Dalmia's' Italian Khana, and it turned out to be a disaster
• Kitchen Confidential by Bourdain, that straddles the 'shock and awe' end of writing about food and cooking. He draws vivid pictures of his heroin-addicted journey from one crazy kitchen to another. 
• The effort in cutting the carrots and giving it perfect shape is mentioned by Bill Buford who runs Babbo in New York. He shows us why we should never think of working in a restaurant kitchen no matter how many guest tell us we should. 
• Mastering the art of French cooking by Julie/Julia : Movie is better than book, she does not cook to perfection but just attempts to cook and tick.
• Blood, Bones and Butter - the book divided into three sessions , memoir of Gabrielle Hamilton, who runs 'Prune' in New York's East Village. - Blood her happy childhood, Bones her struggle after parents divorce and growing up age and in Butter she switches from being a lesbian to a woman married to an Italian man and the mother of two kids. In her world, it seems you can go from not knowing the first thing about running a restaurant to being one of New York's best female chefs, just as easily as you can morph from being a committed lesbian to a happy earth mother sucking baby and a seaside home in Italy. 

She concludes by saying that other than Enid Blyton, perhaps, there a no women writer who can make you drool (or set your hormones ablaze) with their words. 

The book by Veena Venugopal covers not just Culinary but various instances of Literary Love. With the number of various books mentioned in her essays, we get lost in the wonderland of books. As Namita Gokhale has rightly worded and is mentioned on the cover page "A delightful book about the delights of reading". I had a hearty laugh as I read through the 14 evocative and laugh-out- loud essays covered in this.

Though the essay begin with "Coming Home" and " To kill a Mocking Bird", the writing started agonizing over which book should make it to the backpack while planning the trek to Everest Base camp, rather than training. She took  'Touching the void', just after completing 'Into thin air'. Mother was nostalgic as I read through and could see my mother in hers. The Malayalee Mothers concern and instructions to her daughters. Like"Whether the leaf falls on the thorn or the thorn falls on the leaf, it's only the leaf that's ruined.", "Remember when wealth is lost, nothing is lost when health is lost, something is lost; when character is lost, alas, everything is lost." On the book 'Vox' Clinton and Lewinsky, and she lost her character. 

If Everyone's reading means that the hype is good and the book is bad on 'Maximum City' which the author overhears. 

Veena Venugopal fantasized about falling in love with men who share her love of books or is spat upon by a book-crazed gentleman who is compelled to sell his library.  

Book covers what to (not)  read in a Mumbai local train - start reading a new book on Monday/Dont read funny books in train/Cover the book you are reading with brown paper; when you are pregnant and the diwnside of literary festivals/book launches but the need to hide the author. Reads in different places and origin of different genres and how they compliment today's society are also covered. Like Whodunit, Arushi Talwar, Kate Summerscales book 'The suspicions of Mr. Whicher' or 'The Murder at Road Hill House' and Edgar Allen Poe creating the first detective,  Auguste Dupin in 1841.

We need to Read. Rinse. Repeat. As you will be startled by the realization that the person who has changed the most is yourself. The joy of owning a real book and changes over the years. The Joy of reading when you have a child - how the reading pattern change over time.  The last chapter starts with these lines from 'A Suitable Boy'

'And, gentle reader, you as well,

The fountainhead of all remittance,

Buy me before good sense insists

You'll strain your purse and sprain your wrists.'