Phil Miller

Besides the compulsory sex, violence, and alcohol, the novel brings forth tough questions about the CIA and America’s foreign policy. It also hints at the corrosive effects of corruption in the formerly communist nations in Eastern Europe.

Although I haven’t read as much in the “thriller” genre as many readers, it’s the type of story my wife and I watch as series on Netflix or BritBox. And historical fiction and memoir are my favorite kinds of stories. I borrowed this book from the library box across the street from our house. I wonder which neighbor put it there. I enjoyed it despite the predictable surprises which tie all the subplots together, perhaps too neatly.

Instead, now that I’ve read it, I would compare it to the book I read nearly 60 years ago, Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me, by Richard Farina, who was married to Mimi Baez, sister of folksinger Joan. Like that book, Kitchen Confidential consists of raucous tales of drugs, sex, deceit, and truth. However, Bourdain’s book shares a more expansive series of episodes, and yes, its setting is the world behind the swinging doors of restaurant kitchens.

Bourdain disparaged writing: compared to cooking, writing required little effort. Even so, even by his own admission (in his later years), he was a better writer than he was a cook. He never dreamed Kitchen Confidential would be such a worldwide sensation. He expected its audience to be limited to the culinary profession in a limited area around New York City. As a result of its popularity, along with that of other books he published, his professional life shifted to writing and television.

As a memoir covering about 25 years, from high school to middle age, Kitchen Confidential is both a coming-of-age adventure and an eye-opening depiction of certain restaurant kitchens. Hyperbolic descriptions carry the reader with the momentum of a roller coaster. If, by chance, you haven’t yet read this book, first published in 2000 (and again in 2007), expect to have some good belly laughs and to say, from time to time, “Oh, my goodness!”

The main character, Jack Schmidt, is the third-generation owner of a beachfront restaurant, which has been his life and livelihood up to the present day. Now he struggles with a decision: a conglomerate wants to buy his restaurant.

The first third of the book develops a cast of other characters—Jack's closest friend Deacon; Deacon’s wife Andie, who is Jack’s attorney; Nicole, who represents the conglomerate and keeps nudging Jack to accept the offer; Genevieve, who has worked at the restaurant since Jack was a teenager, and who has a son with addictions and a propensity for violence; Kitty, Jack’s former girlfriend, who has returned home from Oregon because her mother is dying; and a roster of restaurant employees—Vivian, Sam, Saul, Vincent, Ernie, and Smokes. Then there are the people in the flashbacks to earlier times—Jack’s father and mother and grandmother; another former girlfriend, Alexis; and more.

The active plot proceeds slowly while the reader becomes acquainted with the characters, but half-way through the story, it surges forward dramatically. I’m glad I had the patience to get through the slower parts because they lay a credible foundation for the interconnected strands of the plot.

It seems too obvious to recommend this novel for your beach vacation, so I’ll suggest you take it along wherever you choose to spend some leisure time. It may help you reflect on transitions or changes in your life, including losses and the way a window slammed shut may cause a door to open.

In this esoteric work, although the characters’ names reflect historical figures who lived decades if not centuries earlier, the author has chosen these names to help the reader understand their roles. Helen resembles Helen of Troy, escaping in a hollowed-out woodpile, reminiscent of the Trojan horse. Tertullian, the Christian teacher, is named for and based on the scholar from the previous century. Elias represents a remnant of the Jewish population after most Jewish people were expelled from Alexandria. Cyril is an actual historical figure, who became bishop in 412 and was a zealous champion of orthodox doctrine. Orestes, Romulus, Martha, Mariam, Matthias, and the other characters relate to historical or mythical figures.

The destruction of the great library of Alexandria was catastrophic. A reader might compare it to the book burning in the Qin Dynasty 400 years earlier, and certainly to the burning of 25,000 books by Nazis on May 10, 1933. These holocausts of knowledge feel devastating to all who love to learn.

The Last Myth of Alexandria offers a hopeful outlook for the continued pursuit of literature, art, and wisdom. As Hannie te Groenhuis says in the Introduction, “free, investigative and sparkling thinking is now under siege.” What forces today threaten scholarship and the arts? Why do certain groups insist on banning books or eliminating public education? Is it brutish anti-intellectualism? Is it a warped Christian “orthodoxy”? These are not without precedent. Imagining a young woman hidden away in a hollowed-out woodpile, or a young man who refuses to speak but spends his life painstakingly copying manuscripts in a dark basement is one way of expressing hope. Surely, we can conceive of more ways to persist in protecting the accumulated wisdom of the world while encouraging further research and creativity.

The Serviceberry, subtitled Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, likewise challenges the reader to become generous, but not from altruistic motives. The author finds a metaphor in the abundance of berries produced by a particular tree and its capacity to provide for birds, for people, and for other creatures.

Kimmerer, a botanist and a member of the Potawatomi Nation, draws on Indigenous traditions such as the potlatch to make her case for a “gift economy” that runs alongside the market economy. In the potlatch tradition among Pacific Northwest peoples, “possessions are given away with lavish generosity to mark meaningful life events.” (p. 35) Although white settlers suppressed this tradition on the grounds that it “undermined the notions of individual property” (p. 36), the custom nurtured good relationships within the community. It is only one example of what the author names as a gift economy.

Other readers may experience what I felt as I read The Serviceberry. There is a sweet kindness in the tone of this book, which encourages recognizing the ways we enjoy enough to share. Meanwhile, there is a moral toughness in the critique of the extractive capitalism which we think is beyond our control and which threatens to make our planet unlivable. For example, “The fossil fuel economy is propelling mass extinction in acidified oceans and disappearing forests, deadly heat waves and untold human suffering.” (p. 102) So, while the book is optimistic regarding our potential to develop gift economies, it is pessimistic about the consequences of continuing to allow extractive capitalism to dominate our way of life.

The Serviceberry, like its eponymous tree, has abundant gifts for readers, both in terms of ideas almost anyone can put into practice, and in terms of juicy quotations for future conversations about sustainability, community, and reciprocity.

This self-published novel is becoming a best-seller because of word-of-mouth publicity. Allen Levi, identified as an attorney, judge, singer/songwriter, and author, writes from the Southeast about a fictional small city in South Georgia with a scenic river, college, and renewed stretch of downtown. Those of us who have lived in Georgia can nearly guess the model for this place, which the author calls Golden.

The town plays its part, but this book is about people. The book’s namesake Theo visits the town and a coffee shop, which displays 92 portraits of residents, all by the same artist. Theo decides to meet some of these people, which gives the plot its structure. To elaborate here could spoil the joy of reading this novel for those who have not yet had the pleasure of meeting Theo and the people of Golden.

Reading Theo of Golden will refresh your sense of wonder at nature’s splendor, rekindle your appreciation for music, enliven your enjoyment of art galleries and museums, help you recover diminished hopes, rejuvenate your capacity for heartfelt love, and cultivate the gladness to be found in generosity.

My interest in reading this book 57 years after it appeared came partly from living near Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where Maya Angelou taught at Wake Forest University for 30 years beginning in 1981. Winston-Salem is “next door” to Greensboro, where I now live.

Not that her memoir takes place in North Carolina. Its settings are St. Louis, Stamps, Arkansas (near Texarkana), San Francisco, and somewhere in Southern California no more than a few hours from Mexico. The 1930s and early 1940s provide the time setting, which equates to her very early childhood up through high school and the birth of her son. Also, this memoir was the first of her 36 published books. James Baldwin gave her advice and encouragement in completing it.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings echoes the lived experience of many Black Americans, particularly Black women. As Oprah Winfrey declares in her Foreword to the 2015 mass market edition, “How could this author, Maya Angelou, have the same life experiences, the same feelings, longings, perceptions, as a poor black girl from Mississippi—as me?” Countless readers have bonded with Maya Angelou for such reasons, and not only Black girls.

This memoir caught on quickly. Probably because, as Oprah Winfrey says,

Maya Angelou… understood that sharing her truth connected her to the greater human truths—of longing, abandonment, security, hope, wonder, prejudice, mystery, and finally, self-discovery: the realization of who you really are and the liberation that love brings.

Last year, I read the book Sexual Terrorism, by Brenita Mitchell. In Maya Angelou’s memoir, written 50 years earlier, I read a painfully personal account of sexual terrorism, the rape of a nine-year-old told from the child’s own viewpoint. That part of the book, which should disturb any reader, kept this book out of school libraries even after other books on the Black life experience were allowed. Today, I hope young people can witness that event and, with mature guidance, process it. Even so, any young person left alone with one unsupervised man remains vulnerable to the risk of life-changing trauma.

Although this memoir includes terribly sad descriptions of racism and sexism, it also shares hilarious episodes, such as Sunday morning scenes in the country church and descriptions of an interdenominational tent revival. In trying to read a page to my wife, I laughed too hard to speak. More poignant humor is laced into her round trip to Mexico with her father, followed by her weeks of living in an abandoned car with other homeless teenagers.

I wasn’t ready for this memoir to end. Readers can be grateful that among Maya Angelou’s 36 books, several more are autobiographical. To learn more about this remarkable human being, I recommend https://www.womenshistory.org/educati... on the women's history museum website.