The Anthony Bourdain Reader: New, Classic and Rediscovered Writing

by Anthony Bourdain

The definitive, career-spanning collection of writing from Anthony Bourdain, including unpublished and never-before-seen material, with an Introduction by Patrick Radden Keefe.

Anthony Bourdain represented many things to many people – and he had many sides. But no part of his identity was more important to him than that of a writer; it was one of the central ways he saw himself. Revealing Anthony Bourdain's observant, curious and hungry mind, The Anthony Bourdain Reader is a collection of Bourdain's best writing and touches on his many pursuits and passions, from restaurant life to family life to the 'low life', from TV to travel through places like Vietnam, Buenos Aires, Paris and Shanghai.

With pointed opinions on the specific use of brioche buns, the devastation of Western foreign policy and the pain and pleasure of hot pot, this new collection encapsulates the unique brilliance of a once-in-a-generation mind and one of our most distinctive writers. After Bourdain's years of travelling the globe in search of the very best of cuisine and culture, The Anthony Bourdain Reader is a testament to the enduring and singular voice he crafted, with eclectic and curated chapters, including visceral graphic novel excerpts, some of his most well-loved recipes and never-before-published pieces.

Edited by Bourdain's long-time agent and friend Kimberly Witherspoon, and with a new Foreword by Patrick Radden Keefe, this is an essential reader for any Bourdain fan as well as a vivid and moving recollection of his life and legacy.

Genres: Nonfiction, Travel, Food, Memoir, Essays, Biography, Cooking

399 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 28, 2025

About the author

Anthony Michael Bourdain was an American celebrity chef, author, and travel documentarian. He starred in programs focusing on the exploration of international culture, cuisine, and the human condition.
Bourdain was a 1978 graduate of The Culinary Institute of America and a veteran of many professional kitchens during his career, which included several years spent as an executive chef at Brasserie Les Halles, in Manhattan. He first became known for his bestselling book Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly (2000).

Bourdain's first food and world-travel television show A Cook's Tour ran for 35 episodes on the Food Network in 2002 and 2003. In 2005, he began hosting the Travel Channel's culinary and cultural adventure programs Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations (2005–2012) and The Layover (2011–2013). In 2013, he began a three-season run as a judge on The Taste and consequently switched his travelogue programming to CNN to host Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown. Although best known for his culinary writings and television presentations, along with several books on food and cooking and travel adventures, Bourdain also wrote both fiction and historical nonfiction.

Reviews

[Sarah Jensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book Review: The Anthony Bourdain Reader
Rating: 4.5/5

Anthony Bourdain’s posthumous anthology, The Anthony Bourdain Reader, is a masterful curation of his literary legacy, showcasing the razor-sharp wit, unflinching honesty, and voracious curiosity that defined his career. Edited by his longtime agent Kimberly Witherspoon, this collection transcends mere nostalgia, offering both longtime fans and new readers a prismatic view of Bourdain’s evolution as a writer—from kitchen confessionalist to global storyteller.

Strengths & Reactions
Bourdain’s voice leaps off the page with its trademark blend of irreverence and insight. The anthology’s eclectic structure—spanning essays, recipes, graphic novel excerpts, and unpublished fragments—mirrors his restless intellect. His writing on food is visceral (his rant about brioche buns is both hilarious and oddly profound ), but it’s his geopolitical musings and self-deprecating reflections on fame that linger. A chapter on Vietnam, for instance, captures his ability to weave personal vulnerability with cultural critique, leaving readers equal parts enlightened and unsettled.

As an academic reader, I appreciated the volume’s refusal to sanitize Bourdain’s edges. His critiques of Western foreign policy and the commodification of travel feel eerily prescient, while his darker, introspective pieces (like those touching on addiction) underscore the duality of his public persona. The inclusion of lesser-known works, such as early fiction attempts, adds depth to understanding his creative process, though some may find these sections uneven compared to his polished nonfiction.

Constructive Criticism
While the anthology is comprehensive, its thematic jumps—from kitchen tales to graphic novels—can feel disjointed. A more structured chronology or thematic grouping might have aided coherence. Additionally, though Witherspoon’s editorial hand is deft, a critical introduction contextualizing Bourdain’s literary influences (e.g., Orwell, Hunter S. Thompson) would have enriched the academic value.

How I would describe this book:
- A feast for the mind—Bourdain’s brilliance, served raw and unfiltered.
- Proof that Bourdain was as much a writer as he was a chef, traveler, and provocateur.
- An essential volume that captures the heartbeat of a generation’s most resonant voice.

Personalized Remarks & Gratitude
Reading this felt like sharing a late-night conversation with Bourdain himself—equal parts exhilarating and melancholic. His ability to find humanity in a bowl of noodles or a war-torn alley remains unmatched. Thank you to Edelweiss and HarperCollins for the advance copy; this anthology is a fitting tribute to a man who taught us to “eat boldly” and think even more boldly.

Final Verdict: 4.5/5 — A must-read for Bourdain devotees and anyone who values writing that crackles with life, even in its darkest corners.

[kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

my partner while i was reading this book:

“when he’s opinionated and unapologetic it’s 'endearing' and 'good writing' but when i do it it’s problematic”

and such is anthony bourdain

[Mai H.]

📱 Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco

[Morgan Wheeler · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was such a beautifully crafted tribute to Anthony Bourdain. I have never been someone who has been affected by celebrity deaths, but his completely gutted me. Since he passed, I haven’t been able to watch reruns of No Reservations and I have wanted to get back into his shows and writing. This was the perfect way to do so. The Bourdain Reader really has a bit of everything in it. While it has excerpts from Anthony’s books and cookbooks, there are handwritten notes, plays he wrote, drawings, comics, ideas for tv shows. You really get a full in-depth look back in to his life. Reading this truly brought me back to his storytelling. Two things Tony always was 1. a chef (regardless of how he viewed himself-food is everywhere in his writing) and 2. an incredible storyteller. Kimberly Witherspoon wrote in the beginning that she hoped she did him justice by putting these items together, and I truly can’t imagine anyone doing a better job. It felt like getting to visit with Tony one more time. Thank you so much to NetGalley and Ecco for the eARC, while it broke my heart to read it, I truly enjoyed every word (and picture).

[Sungyena · Rating 5 out of 5]

I miss him i miss him i miss him. Grateful for the people who loved and knew him to make this book for fans to know a deeper side of him, mainly in that he was always a writer first and being a chef was a livelihood.

[Bodie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bourdain is one of my favourite non-fiction writers, his charm and personality radiate from the page and are utterly unique. His fiction just isn't for me, and that's ok.

[reading is my hustle · Rating 5 out of 5]

bourdain was filled with relentless curiosity + intellect.
i miss him so much.

[Bob Schnell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like many others, I was gutted when Anthony Bourdain succumbed to his inner demons and took his own life. I had seen all of his television shows and read most of his books. When I saw "The Anthony Bourdain Reader" on the library shelf I knew I had to check it out.

If you have never read anything Bourdain wrote, this would be an excellent primer. As a long-time fan, I felt there was too much recycled and not enough unpublished or new-to-me material. However, it was nice to spend a few commutes with Tony, his voice working as a sort of security blanket during the rush hours.

[Sophie Kitchen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Anthony Bourdain Reader is a comprehensive anthology of his writings across almost the entirety of his career. It contains both published and unpublished works, across a variety of mediums, both fiction and non-fiction. The book is organised according to different themes and ideas that Bourdain explored in his writing, but his indisputable love and admiration for food and the Restaurant industry is pertinent throughout.

I really wanted to like this book more than I did. This was my first experience with Bourdain's fiction and I have to say that it was not a memorable one. His fiction is, in a word, fine, but it pales in comparison to the raw honesty of his non-fiction — a distinction that is particularly glaring when you read them in such close proximity to each other.

3.5 ☆

[Virginia Palencia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bittersweet and extensive collection of Bourdain’s writing, both fiction and non-fiction. There were quite a few pieces in here that have not been published and I had never seen before. While I enjoyed his fiction, the non-fiction really made me miss him and how very talented he was.

[RONALD MELCHER · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well-curated collection of pieces that showcase a variety of Bourdain's writings including excerpts from well known books like "Kitchen Confidential" and a "Cooks Tour", to magazine articles, non-fiction, scripts and even graphic comics. Many items have never been published.
The pieces are thoughtfully arranged by topic and capture a lifetime of writing from a 1971 high school creative writing composition to his final unpublished piece.
Even for someone like me, who has read a lot of Bourdain and seen a lot of his television, this collection will provide additional insight into the man. Sadly, it gives us even more reasons to miss his voice.

[Finn Hussey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't say enough good about Anthony Bourdain. His voice is so well heard through each and every phase of his writing, and this book shows a light on all varieties and eras of his writing. Some I've read before but most was new to me.

Not a lot new to say about Bourdain that I haven't said in my reviews for Kitchen Confidential & Medium Raw , but I will forever be inspired by the raw view he took on life.

Rest in Peace Anthony Bourdain
5/5 Stars
Finn H seal of understanding our world isn't good enough for some

[Kendra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bourdain is one of those people that took time to connect with society. To see the beauty in the mundane. The importance in food, passion, and words. I will forever cherish his talents and this collection is a wonderful embodiment of his creativity. Included are short stories, scripts, comics, drawings and all of Bourdain’s personality. I will absolutely be rereading his words as I continue to miss his contributions to our world.

Thank you NetGalley, Ecco, and Kimberly Witherspoon for putting together this collection and gifting me the eARC in exchange for my honest review. “The Anthony Bourdain Reader” is expected to be published October 28, 2025!

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nicely packaged bit of barrel scraping from Bloomsbury. The highfalutin title of ‘Reader’ promises a collection of the author’s most essential works, and I was expecting something akin to Hunter S. Thompson’s The Great Shark Hunt, e.g. the best of the uncollected articles folded in with extended extracts from the major books. Instead we get a not entirely appetising hotpot of prime cuts, offcuts, offal and gristle.

The famous New Yorker article that landed Bourdain his big break is included, but there’s remarkably little from Kitchen Confidential, the bestseller on which his ‘literary’ reputation will forever be based. The less popular follow-ups, Medium Raw and A Cook’s Tour, are both over- and under-represented by frequent but frustratingly short little excerpts.

Nevertheless, these are the most satisfying dishes on this tasting menu. They represent the gossipy, abrasive, grittily incisive Bourdain that endeared him to every docker’s cap wearing hipster in the western world.

The rest is fairly uneven, some of it goes down all right and some of it makes you want to boak. The fiction could, at best, be described as ‘competent’. Placed side by side with Bourdain’s non-fiction pieces, you can tell they’re just reheated anecdotes that he tells better in the first person. The comics are much more entertaining, with their grand guignol takes on culinary folk tales. I would have preferred to see more of these than another extended bit of riffage (roughage) from Bone in the Throat.

The facsimiles of pages from his cookbooks and obscure fanzines are pure padding. As for the juvenilia, including short stories from the late 70s, when Bourdain was barely out his teens, these ought to have stayed in the archive. It tends to be the case with inconveniently dead authors that their ‘new’ material is generally anything thought unfit for publication when they were alive. And I’m not sure any writer would like their school projects served up next to their most iconic works.

Overcooked then. Too many ingredients. Like Marco Pierre White says, ‘keep it simple,’ and just buy Kitchen Confidential instead.

[T · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bourdain's journalistic and memoir-y voice are second-to-none: fresh, real, unflinching. It's a joy to be with him. His fiction is not great — cliched, restauranty vignettes revolving around drinking, for the most part.

[Kallin · Rating 4 out of 5]

a bit eclectic, but I enjoyed the writings

[Kelly Sedinger · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. A great collection of writing by a great, and badly missed, writer. More Bourdain is always good.

[Scott Sanders · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Bourdain still feels like sitting with an old friend. You may know some of the stories but that only adds to the enjoyment.

[Nuha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thank you to Ecco and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!

Available October 2025.

I came upon Anthony Bourdain when I was stuck in the house during quarantine. He had committed suicide a few years before that & it felt extremely vouyeristic to watch a dead man give tours of countries, histories, and food ways. However, I couldn't stop watching - Bourdain's mix of social commentary, humor, and food was just too addictive. The world he showed felt so foreign & so quickly slipping away - it's a bit like watching a time machine. This collection feels the same way - vouyeristic with its mix of unpublished stories & diary entries, a wry mix of humor and disdain at the world, and a look into the crazy world of kitchens from the 70s to the early aughts. It makes me appreciate Bourdain more.

[Michael Triantafyllou · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading this was like standing next to him at a pub and sharing a beer together. I especially liked the non fiction bits for this reason

[Bru · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really dark, twisted, and poetic in a way that always hits. Writes in a way you can really hear his voice. Unshamed. I hate cooking, but love process like this described. Made me really really want to go to Vietnam.

[DeAnn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is for fans of Bourdain, a posthumous collection of works as a celebration of his writing. And yet, reading this collection of his works from teenage years to the very last article he wrote, it feels almost wrong to be peeking into these private thoughts. How horrified would I be if my journals from age 19 were published? I felt conflicted but also curious about seeing these tidbits of his life, the handwritten scraps of paper, drawings and comics, sketches and poems.

The unfinished novel in the book was one of my favorite excerpts, although of course I wish he had finished it. I have read one of Bourdain’s other fiction novels, Bone in the Throat, which was an early work, before Kitchen Confidential and his TV fame. You can see the tremendous growth in his fiction writing from that book to the unfinished one. His travel experiences seep into the pages of the book, especially in the food descriptions. The plot reminds me of something Carl Hiaasen might write, tropical island crime fiction, but with the swagger and snarky coolness we all love about Bourdain.

His unique voice shines in any piece he writes. As I read his writing, I imagine his voice in my head, the familiar narrator from all those voiceovers of episodes I have and will continue to rewatch countless times.

A large portion of the book included excerpts taken from his other non-fiction books, which I have read multiple times. I skimmed these sections since I am already very familiar with them. Overall, this was an excellent collection of works by a strange, brilliant, and complicated man. I could sense the influences of Hunter S. Thompson and Chuck Palahniuk in his fiction, the plots filled with drug-fueled debauchery and carnage… and so much delicious food, of course.

Thanks to NetGalley & Harper Collins for the advanced reader's copy. This book releases in October 2025.

[Zoe]

“He taught me early that the value of a dish is the pleasure it brings you; where you are sitting when you eat it—and who you are eating it with—are what really matter. Perhaps the most important life lesson he passed on was: Don't be a snob. It's something I will always at least aspire to—something that has allowed me to travel this world and eat all it has to offer without fear or prejudice. To experience joy, my father taught me, one has to leave oneself open to it.” -p.92 (“How Anthony Bourdain Came to Be Anthony Bourdain”)

“Criminals ‘talk funny’—and seem, even in real life, to get themselves into absurd and often humorous situations. Mobsters and lawmen, it appears, can't avoid the cruelly ironic in their daily work. And they seem at times, from what I can tell, to have a lot of fun exploring the soft and vulnerable spots in each other's natures, looking for areas to exploit. A wise guy looks to take advantage of some knucklehead restaurateur who finds himself overextended, seeing it as an opportunity to lend money at usurious rates, acquire food and property for resale, provide patronage jobs for cronies who need visible sources of legitimate income—or are too stupid to steal—and farm out business to associated criminal enterprises. Prosecutors and cops, on the other hand, are looking for an unhappy criminal—somebody passed over for promotion, under-rewarded by his masters for his loyal services over the years. They want to take advantage of his failings, his feelings of pride, bitterness, spite, or fear. They're looking for a bad guy in trouble to squeeze—someone with a long prison sentence hanging over his head, or a very real concern that one of these days, his best buddy is going to put a bullet behind his ear. The manipulation of sources and informants can be as cruel and as callous, and hopefully as funny, as the workaday business of loan-sharking, extortion, and murder.” -p.275~276 (“I’m a Chef…”)

“It's the little things I want to know about. Before the killers loaded their weapons and dressed themselves in identical raincoats and hats, before they set out separately from their modest family homes in Staten Island and Queens, did the killers kiss their children, jot down brief shopping lists of groceries to bring back on their return? (One box Cheerios... half gallon milk milk... dozen eggs... tampons, large... two cans tuna, chunk style.) Did their voices tighten at all at the breakfast table when they told their wives that they might be a little late tonight? Did they program the VCR to tape their favorite sit-com? And what sitcom was it? It's the jargon of crime—the characters, the rituals, the workaday details—that fascinate me.” -p.280~281 (“Crime”)

“Guys who wake up every morning, brush their teeth, shower, shave, then go to work at the serious business of committing felonies, these are the characters who continue to dominate my reverie and my fiction. Bank robbers, spies, enforcers, contract killers, loan sharks, confidence men, and racketeers...it's their consistency over time, their relentless adherence to the requirements of the job, that makes me, in my way, love them.” -p.282 (“Crime”)

“It's something I'm seeing everywhere in Vietnam; what makes its food so good, its people so endearing and impressive: pride. It's everywhere. From top to bottom, everyone seems to be doing the absolute best they can with what they have, improvising, repairing, innovating. l's a spirit revealed in every noodle stall, every leaky sampan, every swept and combed dirt porch and green rice paddy. You see it in the mud-packed dikes and levees of their centuries-old irrigation system, every monkey bridge, restored shoe, tire turned sandal, litterless urban stret, patched roof, and swaddled baby in brighly colored hand-knit cap. Think what you want about Vietnam and about communism and about whatever it was that really happened there all those years ago.
Ignore, if you care to, the obvious—that the country is, and was always, primarily about family, village, province, and then country—that ideology is a luxury few can afford. You cannot help but be impressed and blown away by the hard work, the attention to detail, the care taken in every facet of daily life, no matter how mundane, no matter how difficult the circumstances. Spend some time in the Mekong Delta and you'll understand how a nation of farmers could beat the largest and most powerful military presence on the planet. Just watch the women in the rice paddies, bent at the waist for eight, ten hours a day, yanking bundles of rice from knee-deep water, then moving them, replanting them. Take a while to examine the intricate interlocked system of Stone Age irrigation, unchanged for hundreds and hundreds of years, the level of cooperation necessary among neighbors simply to scratch out a living, and you'll get the idea.” -p.343~344 (“Highway of Death”)

[Books To Bowls · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the closest you can come to reaching across the bar and shaking Anthony Bourdain's hand as it gets. It is about peeling back the layers as to who the man was beyond just his rock and roller status of being a celebrity chef.

I was only introduced to him after his passing in 2018. Even then it was only glimpses in the flash of hotel room televisions and the occasional YouTube clip. All of which pointed to him as being 'America's Chef' whose voice could calm thunder and brought an almost poetic realism to the kitchen. It wasn't until I picked up a copy of his cookbook Appetites when I became curious as to who he was as a person. Who was the human being behind the tv persona who could himself be this sort of cooking conundrum?

This book was everything I could have hoped for. You get to feel the strong handshake but still notice the tired eyes. You'll read snid-bits of his most popular work that propped him up. Parts the whole world saw. And then something so incredibly intimate that its possible Bourdain never meant to show anyone, ever. But you get to see it. Unpublished, untyped, handwritten diary entries. Poorly flowing plays. Surprisingly engaging and rounded out short stories about gangsters. Little bits and pieces of him that will have you look up from the last page and almost see him in front of you as a wisping ghost.

Is this something that should be added to your permanent collect or be a required reading? Absolutely not. Bourdain would agree with me too. Was he the one who made the life of a chef seem like the life of a rock star and propel cooks to a new level of fame? I would make that argument, certainly. But at the end of the day, the thing I believe he would want to be remembered as was the guy who sat across from you at the bar, and you would drink, laugh, connect. And at the end of the night, simply be a fond memory.

"When people ask me if I miss it, my answer is always the same.
No, I don't.....
What I do miss, I tell them, and will always miss, is that first pull on a cold beer after work. That is irreplaceable"
~Anthony Bourdain

I will say that here are going to be repeated themes and imagery. You can tell that at one point early on in his career a chef overseeing Anthony's station made a lasting impression when they threw their burnt blistered hands in front of his face. That imagery pops up three or four times. The writings are also not chronological. They are organized by theme. Anger. Drugs. Fame. And his writing reflects periods of his life where he was drowning in them. So, you will feel lost on occasion. However, I will give kudos to the editor for their astounding ability to right the ship and put you right back in it.

Will this book make the same impact if you have already read his works? I can't say. All I can say with certainty is that this man could write. And when he wrote he attached a small part of his soul to it. What a way to meet the man. Even if only in the ether.

[Darius Ostrowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have very ambivalent feelings about “The Anthony Bourdain Reader: New, Classic, and Rediscovered Writing” by Anthony Bourdain, edited by Kimberly Witherspoon. On one side, it captures the rawness of Bourdain’s writing and personality, from when he was a teenager up until his untimely death. On the other, it only provides brief glimpses of the awesomeness of his work and also reinforces all that we lost when he died, leaving us to want more.

Kimberly Witherspoon was Bourdain’s longtime friend and agent, and she does an admirable job picking pieces, both personal and public, that capture the essence of the man we know: cook/chef, traveler/adventurer, curious seeker of new things, and (most importantly to him) writer. We see early diaries and travel logs, TV scripts and fiction ideas, non-fiction tales, even some illustrations and tries at comics. Anthony was a chronicler and observer of the world around him, even at a young age. We can also see how his style and confidence grew over time, getting stronger as a storyteller.

We also get his unfiltered opinions, whether its about food, or tourists, or government policy – Anthony was not afraid of telling us what he thought, about how he realized how lucky he was to live the life that he led. From his love affair with Vietnam, to working in a restaurant, to how he tried to keep his TV shows somewhat authentic, Bourdain always let you know how he felt.

A huge loss for the travel/food communities. Although this book provides some insights that aren’t available elsewhere (including an awesome start to an unfinished novel), do yourself a favor and read everything else he has written. It will be well worth it.

I requested and received a free advanced electronic copy from Ecco via NetGalley. Thank you!

[Mark Ortiz Ortiz Ortiz · Rating 4 out of 5]

📚 Book Review 📚

The Anthony Bourdain Reader
Release date: October 25th, 2025
Length: 478 pages
Rated: 4/5 ⭐

The Anthony Bourdain Reader is a collection of stories, journals, poems, and short pieces from the life and career of the late Anthony Bourdain.

It’s fascinating to dive into his unreleased material and see how deeply he was influenced by the writers and journalists who shaped his voice. Across the pages you find a young boy mourning his father, an angry chef frustrated with his place in the world, and a man battling addiction while searching for a rock bottom that might finally force him to change.

But what I appreciated most about this collection is that it reminded me why I love Bourdain. He really is our modern-day Bukowski: an angry, working-class stiff fed up with a society that chews up workers while handing the world over to entitled brats. He doesn’t taste success until later in life, after decades of living paycheck to paycheck, numbing himself with drugs, sex, and rock ’n’ roll. Those frustrations burn through his writing as he tears into entitled vegans, spoiled American travelers, and the general short-sightedness of modern life.

Like much of his work, this collection makes you want to quit the job you hate, book the trip you’ve been putting off for years, and break free from that 9-to-5 grind—if only in our dreams.

It’s a 4/5 ⭐ for me, only because I’d already read most of the pieces. There wasn’t as much new material as I expected. But the writing itself is a 10/5 ⭐.

#anthonybourdain #kitchenconfidential #cheflife

[Allison Hammat · Rating 5 out of 5]

No one writes about food the way Anthony Bourdain does. Whether it’s cooking it, eating it, or traveling to find it, his writing is poetic with a mix of rage, adoration, and nostalgia. It’s hard to believe he’s been gone for seven years now or that Kitchen Confidential just hit its twenty-fifth anniversary. While I know he is gone, I have found myself craving more of his work, rewatching old episodes of No Reservations to scratch the itch but not quite getting rid of it.

Enter: The Anthony Bourdain Reader, a beautiful compilation of unpublished works and familiar favorites, edited by Bourdain’s agent and friend, Kimberly Witherspoon. Witherspoon’s personal anecdotal chapter introductions add insight into her friend Tony, showing a new layer to who he was off the screen. You can feel Witherspoon’s love and care for her friend in her words.

I thoroughly enjoyed that Witherspoon opted to photocopy several Bourdain’s works through the book, giving the reader the opportunity to read in his handwriting, see some of his drawings, and connect more with the works.

My favorite chapter in the book was Vietnam. I laughed, grimaced, and glued my eyes to the page with intrigue reading about his experience eating the entire cobra at Huong Rung Restaurant.

If you’re an Anthony Bourdain fan, this book is for you. If you’re a lover of food and travel, this book is for you.

Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco for the e-arc of this book

[Joy Phenix · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to Ina Gartner’s memoir at the same time as reading The Anthony Bourdain Reader in hardback. The Bourdain book is a collection of his notable stories as well as previously unpublished (and sometimes unfinished) works. I couldn’t help but compare their experiences in the food industry and as writers/storytellers.
First the similarities: both written in first person, both successful entrepreneurs, both (reluctant) Food Network stars, both enjoy food.
The differences are far more lengthy and honestly gave me whiplash. (Not their fault. I should have had some sort of palate cleanser happening between the stories).
Still, I’m combining these reviews because they are now inseparable.

She is a cook. He is a Chef.
Ina grew up with cold, isolating parents and compensated by being as warm a human being as possible.
Tony grew up in a loving home and longed to live the life of sex, drugs, rock and roll. Adventure on overdrive.
Ina’s work experience demanded running into Manhattan for imported cheese and pickled sardines while creating chicken salad and baguettes for the demanding customers in the Hamptons.
Tony cranked out foie gras, sweet breads, and steak frites in kitchens serving NYT food critics and funded by the mob.
Ina separated from her husband for some vague reasons while Tony detailed the trials of being a heroin and cocaine addict.
While both were fascinating reads - Tony was far more authentic and oh so dark - I found myself in a Goldilocks situation. One felt too cold and one felt too hot, but I wouldn’t send either dish back.

[Jen Thiel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even though I grew up during the height of Anthony Bourdain’s popularity on television I think I was too young at the time to truly appreciate what a gift he was to the world. The great part about this collection is that it sheds light on the fact that even though Anthony was most famous for his t.v. shows and culinary acumen the thing he should be remembered for might just be his writing. This collection combines all different types of pieces of writing from Anthony throughout his life from fiction, to non-fiction, to graphic novels and I think the most heartbreaking part is that it’s truly through his writing that you can see who he was deep down and why he struggled the way he did with substances throughout his life, but at the end of the day I hope that people choose to pick up this collection and instead of being sad that we lost someone too soon - maybe take a page out of Anthony’s book and decide that while you’re here, you put everything into trying to become the best version of yourself that you can ❤️.

[Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a die-hard Bourdain fan, this book would work in the same manner that the Beatles Anthology works for a Beatle Fanatic. All the little bits and lost pieces come together. Since he will not be creating anything else in this world, there is a bit sadness in the scraps that are held out. There are lots of unpublished pieces, and they were unpublished for a reason, just like Beatle out-takes. They weren't good enough. Lots of early works and notes, which, like the Beatles early stuff, is good for understanding how the author got to where he was, but that's about it. There is an unfinished novel that just dies out; for me a waste of time. I have to admit that I spent quite a bit of time looking for a reason for Bourdain's death, and maybe there is something in there, but I'm still puzzled and sad by his ending. If you are one that enjoys Bourdain's writing style and knack for descriptions, you will like it. I was "MEH."