“Twenty-two thousand Sleepless on Earth, 95 percent of them in the United States. Eighty percent of those within Sanctuary. Ad since nearly all Sleepless babies were not born, not created in vitro, most Sleepless were now born inside Sanctuary. Parents across the country continued to purchase other genetic alterations: enhanced IQ, sharpened sight, a strong immune system, high cheekbones…. But not Sleeplessness.”

In 2008, Roger and Elizabeth Camden visit a doctor to ‘create’ their dream baby. A girl. Blonde. Green eyes. Tall. Slender. High intelligence. A sense of daring. All these are on the list. As well as no need to sleep. This ‘Sleepless’ program is secret, but Camden is rich and powerful enough to ferret out its existence. And there have been nineteen healthy, intelligent, psychologically normal Sleepless children born so far. The twentieth, sadly, dead. Shaken too hard by a mother who couldn’t cope with a baby who cried 24 hours a day. Fifteen years later, there are 1,082 in the US, more in the rest of the world. Later, it is learnt that the Sleepless are, in a sense, immortal.

So Leisha Camden is Sleepless number 20. She has a twin, Alice, a ‘normal’ girl, a Sleeper.  Roger Camden favours Leisha, Elizabeth Camden, Alice.

“You’re sure the second fetus is no threat to my daughter?”
Susan said deliberately, “Nor is the genetically altered fetus a threat to the naturally conceived one.”
He smiled. His voice was low and wistful. “And you think that should matter to me just as much. But it doesn’t. And why should I fake what I feel?”

It is not easy being Sleepless. Sure, school work and the like are easier to handle. After all, there’s no need to sleep. But they aren’t accepted by the Sleepers. As the majority of Sleepers despise their ‘unfair’ advantage. Fast forward to 2051 and this divide has become even more severe as the We-Sleep movement is gaining momentum, with Sleepers buying products made by Sleepers, with profits going solely to Sleepers. And in the Sanctuary, funded largely by wealthy, fanatical Sleepless Jennifer Shafiri, it is the same for the powerful Sleepless, who more or less control most of the world economy. Leisha is one of the few who wants to unite this world, to bridge the economies. She is shunned by those in Sanctuary.

We progress to 2075, when Sanctuary is orbital, although it and its members are still part of the United States. And now there are the Super-Sleepless children or teens, whose brains operate at several times the speed of the Sleepless, with enhanced concentration and mnemonic capabilities. This gene modification (or genemod) though results in minor loss of motor control, so that the Super-Sleepless twitch.

If all this isn’t disturbing enough, the Sleepless Council on Sanctuary (who run the place, with the Shafiri family presiding) are faced with difficult decisions. Sleeper babies have been born to Sleepless families. A productive Sleepless is hurt in an accident and requires round-the-clock care. In the minds of many on the council, especially Jennifer Shafiri, these people are not productive. For:

“To be productive was to be fully human. To share your productivity with the community in strict fairness was to create strength and protection for all. Anyone who would try to violate either truth – to reap the benefits of community without in turn contributing productively to it – was obscene, an inhuman beggar.”

Beggars in Spain is both a terrifying and remarkable book. There is science and it is fiction. There’s plenty of politics. But the science isn’t the sort that whooshes way above your head. Kress explains it all well, weaves it in deftly, and gives us these characters, especially Miri, a Super-Sleepless, who take us through this evolving society, so like and unlike our own.

“What if you walk down that street in Spain and a hundred beggars each want a dollar and you say no and they have nothing to trade you but they’re so rotten with anger about what you have that they knock you down and grab it and then beat you out of sheer envy and despair?”

Happy Lunar New Year everyone! It’s obviously not a holiday here in the US but in Singapore, it is, so hope everyone in Singapore had a great day off. My parents and sister had a big shabu-shabu-style hotpot at my aunt’s house for reunion dinner on the eve (Sunday night) and on the next day (the first day – it’s traditionally 15 days of celebration), they themselves hosted our relatives on my dad’s side for a big 10-course lunch (most of it ordered from a restaurant) including my favourite yu sheng (raw fish salad  - which seems to mostly be a Singaporean/Malaysian dish). I’m afraid I have to recycle my photo from last year as I doubt I’ll get to have yu sheng this year….

Anyway, 新年快乐! May the Dragon year be a happy, healthy one!

Tossing yu sheng

Voice Over: A Novel (French Voices (Seven Stories Press)) – Celine Curiol

As I mentioned earlier, I’m interested in reading more translated works in February. Well I decided to get things started with a few books from the library, like this one.

A lonely young woman works as an announcer in Paris’s gare du Nord train station. Obsessed with a man attached to another woman, she wanders through the world of dinner parties, shopping excursions, and chance sexual encounters with a sense of haunting expectation. As something begins to happen between her and the man she loves, she finds herself at a crossroads, pitting her desire against her sanity. This smashing debut novel sparkles with mordant humor and sexy charm.

The Rising of the Moon

First saw this on Bookslut: “I don’t read Mitchell — I inhale her, laughing my socks off the entire time”. And with that, I knew I had to read something by her.

Every full moon, a Ripper runs amok on the streets of Brentford. Masters Simon and Keith Innes set out to catch the killer under the disturbing guidance of the repellently delightful sleuth, Mrs. Bradley. Full of the very British eccentric goings-on that mark the popular tales of Gladys Mitchell, this shows her at her mordant and morbid best.

Serenity: The Shepherd’s Tale – Zack Whedon, Joss Whedon et al

Oh I loved Serenity (although I only watched it after it was cancelled) and Shepherd Book is one interesting (and mysterious character). This graphic novel reveals his background, which I’ve always been quite curious about!

One of Serenity’s greatest mysteries is finally revealed in The Shepherd’s Tale, filling in the life of one of the show’s most beloved characters – Shepherd Book! Who was Book before meeting Mal and the rest of the Serenity crew, how did he become one of their most trusted allies, and how did he find God in a bowl of soup? Answers to these and more questions about Book’s past are uncovered in this original hardcover graphic novel by rising stars Zack Whedon (Dr. Horrible, Terminator, Fringe) and Chris Samnee (Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps, Daredevil) . A pivotal chapter in the ongoing Serenity saga, The Shepherd’s Tale is also a rollicking, action-packed epic in its own right.

The Walking Dead, Book 2 - Robert Kirkman (Author), Charlie Adlard (Illustrator)

Buried in Print’s post reminded me that I’ve not kept up with this series.

This hardcover features issues #13-24 of the hit series along with the covers for each of the issues, all in one oversized hardcover volume. Continuing the tale of Rick Grimes and his band of survivors from the zombie apocalypse that has ravaged the world.

Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life – Sandra Beasley

We recently discovered that wee reader’s eczema may be due to food allergies. A blood test showed that he’s allergic to wheat, egg whites and peanuts. His allergist said there’s a possibility that he might outgrow these allergies but for now, it’s all about avoidance (and boy is wheat in everything!).

Like twelve million other Americans, Sandra Beasley suffers from food allergies. Her allergies—severe and lifelong—include dairy, egg, soy, beef, shrimp, pine nuts, cucumbers, cantaloupe, honeydew, mango, macadamias, pistachios, cashews, swordfish, and mustard. Add to that mold, dust, grass and tree pollen, cigarette smoke, dogs, rabbits, horses, and wool, and it’s no wonder Sandra felt she had to live her life as “Allergy Girl.” When butter is deadly and eggs can make your throat swell shut, cupcakes and other treats of childhood are out of the question—and so Sandra’s mother used to warn guests against a toxic, frosting-tinged kiss with “Don’t kill the birthday girl!”

It may seem that such a person is “not really designed to survive,” as one blunt nutritionist declared while visiting Sandra’s fourth-grade class. But Sandra has not only survived, she’s thrived—now an essayist, editor, and award-winning poet, she has learned to navigate a world in which danger can lurk in an unassuming corn chip. Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl is her story.

With candor, wit, and a journalist’s curiosity, Sandra draws on her own experiences while covering the scientific, cultural, and sociological terrain of allergies. She explains exactly what an allergy is, describes surviving a family reunion in heart-of-Texas beef country with her vegetarian sister, delves into how being allergic has affected her romantic relationships, exposes the dark side of Benadryl, explains how parents can work with schools to protect their allergic children, and details how people with allergies should advocate for themselves in a restaurant.

A compelling mix of memoir, cultural history, and science, Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl is mandatory reading for the millions of families navigating the world of allergies—and a not-to-be-missed literary treat for the rest of us.

Dealing with Food Allergies in Babies and Children – Janice Vickerstaff Joneja

The tools and methods this guide provides for analyzing and treating allergies in children are adaptable to a variety of situations—without ever losing sight of a child’s nutritional needs. Recognizing that deficiencies in critical nutrients during a child’s early years can have enormous consequences on growth and bodily functions, the book focuses on prevention and allergy management during pregnancy, in the early weeks of life, and in early childhood. The unique allergen scale and the strategies for confronting the 10 most common allergens will help parents balance their child’s specific nutritional needs while managing delicate allergies to food.

The Essential Feminist Reader – Estelle Freedman (Editor)

Including: Susan B. Anthony Simone de Beauvoir W.E.B. Du Bois Hélène Cixous Betty Friedan Charlotte Perkins Gilman Emma Goldman Guerrilla Girls Ding Ling • Audre Lorde John Stuart Mill Christine de Pizan Adrienne Rich Margaret Sanger Huda Shaarawi • Sojourner Truth Mary Wollstonecraft Virginia Woolf

The Essential Feminist Reader is the first anthology to present the full scope of feminist history. Prizewinning historian Estelle B. Freedman brings decades of teaching experience and scholarship to her selections, which span more than five centuries. Moving beyond standard texts by English and American thinkers, this collection features primary source material from around the globe, including short works of fiction and drama, political manifestos, and the work of less well-known writers.

Freedman’s cogent Introduction assesses the challenges facing feminism, while her accessible, lively commentary contextualizes each piece. The Essential Feminist Reader is a vital addition to feminist scholarship, and an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the history of women.

A couple of Overdrive e-books (translated of course)
The Lake – Banana Yoshimoto, Michael Emmerich (Translator)

While The Lake shows off many of the features that have made Banana Yoshimoto famous—a cast of vivid and quirky characters, simple yet nuanced prose, a tight plot with an upbeat pace—it’s also one of the most darkly mysterious books she’s ever written.

It tells the tale of a young woman who moves to Tokyo after the death of her mother, hoping to get over her grief and start a career as a graphic artist. She finds herself spending too much time staring out her window, though … until she realizes she’s gotten used to seeing a young man across the street staring out his window, too.

They eventually embark on a hesitant romance, until she learns that he has been the victim of some form of childhood trauma. Visiting two of his friends who live a monastic life beside a beautiful lake, she begins to piece together a series of clues that lead her to suspect his experience may have had something to do with a bizarre religious cult. . . .

With its echoes of the infamous, real-life Aum Shinrikyo cult (the group that released poison gas in the Tokyo subway system), The Lake unfolds as the most powerful novel Banana Yoshimoto has written. And as the two young lovers overcome their troubled past to discover hope in the beautiful solitude of the lake in the countryside, it’s also one of her most moving.

The Confessions of Noa Weber – Gail Hareven (Author), Dalya Bilu (Translator)

Acclaimed author Noa Weber has a successful “feminist” life: a strong career, a wonderful daughter she raised alone, and she is a recognized and respected cultural figure. Yet her interior life is bound by her obsessive love for one man—Alek, a Russian émigré and the father of her child, who has drifted in and out of her life.

Trying to understand—as well as free herself from—this lifelong obsession, Noa turns her pen on herself, and with relentless honesty dissects her life. Against the evocative setting of turbulent, modernday Israel, this examination becomes a quest to transform irrational desire into a greater, transcendent understanding of love.

The Confessions of Noa Weber introduces a startlingly talented writer in a rich tale that illuminates the desires, yearnings, and complexities of life in Israel.

And some board books for wee reader

Little One Step – Simon James

On the Night You Were Born – Nancy Tillman

A to Z – Sandra Boynton

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? See more Library Loot here.

Among my targets are the books longlisted for the Best Translated Book Award (BTBA). Unfortunately my library doesn’t have a lot of them so when these actual titles aren’t available, I’ve looked up the authors instead. Many of these authors have been on my to-read-ar for a while but there are plenty of new faces to meet. And I’m looking forward to my February in Translation!

Here’s a (rather long) list of potential books:

Via BTBA (Longlisted titles)
Hygiene and the Assassin – Amelie Nothomb
I curse the River of Time – Per Petterson
The Black Minutes – Martin Solares
Agaat – Marlene Van Niekerk
News from the Empire – Fernando del Paso
The Tanners – Robert Walser
Voice Over – Celine Curiol
The Savage Detectives – Roberto Bolano
Missing Soluch – Mahmoud Dowlatabadi

Via the BBC World Book Club podcast
To the End of the Land – David Grossman
Woman at point zero – Nawal El Saadawi
The winter queen: a novel – Boris Akunin

Other books off my TBR list
The Accordionist’s Son – Bernardo Atxaga
Brothers – Yu Hua
Chronicle of a Blood Merchant – Yu Hua
Someone to Run With – David Grossman
The Confessions of Noa Weber – Gail Hareven
In the Sea there are Crocodiles: Based on The True Story Of Enaiatollah Akbari – Fabio Geda
The Lake – Banana Yoshimoto
Hotel Iris – Yoko Ogawa
The Elegance of the Hedgehog – Muriel Barbery
Shifu, you’ll do anything for a laugh – Mo Yan
he song of everlasting sorrow: a novel of Shanghai – Wang Anyi
The gardens of light: a novel – Amin Maalouf
The Changeling – Kenzaburo Oe
The Boat to Redemption – Su Tong

What’s your favourite translated book?

As best as we could, using the butter-yellow melamine plates, we artfully arranged soppressata, Alphonse olives, hard cheeses, and bread that had crust and body – that could actually hurt the roof of your mouth if you were accustomed. We fried fatty, bony duck wings and coated them in toasted sesame seeds. We untangled mounds of curly bitter endive and tamed it with pear and walnuts and vinegar with bacon fat.

As I made my way through this book, I kept thinking: man, this book and her life are imbued, suffused, just completely infused with food. And my other thought: good god, what a life she had led. Being left on her own (accidentally?) as a kid and taking on a job at a restaurant (and hijacking cars in workshops to get to said job) to make money, essentially her first and very young foray into the culinary universe. Working as an underaged waitress at a bar. Doing coke and other drugs. Backpacking through Europe in winter with not very much money. Saying yes to owning a restaurant when she’s had no experience managing one (she’s had plenty of experience working as a catering chef but that’s a different ball game). Cooking for summer campers, including a young gourmand who’s father is a rather famous someone and some idiotic counselors who feel for the lobsters they’re going to consume anyway. Taking up an MFA in Michigan. Working the egg station at her restaurant while heavily pregnant and scheduling her childbirth when some members of her kitchen staff quit on her! This is a life boldly (perhaps sometimes a little foolishly?), led. And she puts all of it into her New York restaurant, Prune.

And I wanted to bring all of it, every last detail of it – the old goat herder smoking filterless cigarettes coming down the mountain, crushing oregano and wild mint underfoot; Iannis cooking me two fried eggs without even asking me if I cared for something to eat; that sweet creamy milk that the milk wallah in Delhi frothed by pouring in a long sweeping arc between two pots held as far apart as the full span on his arms from his cart decorated with a thousand fresh marigolds – into this tiny thirty-seat restaurant.

This book shines with such a gorgeous, delicious lustre when Hamilton talks about food, about her mom’s teaching them to forage for food in their own backyard, about Andre Soltner of Lutèce making an omelette, about making oriecchette in Italy (she married an Italian who courted her with homemade ravioli), and even about freelancing at catering companies (which makes me so rethink ever eating catered food. Here’s a hint: you know those canapes on toasts? Those toasts probably have been sitting around in the kitchens for days and days.)

We’d tromp around in the mud and taunt the geese in the meadow who’d lower their necks and come at us hissing mad, try to spear fish in the stream, and pick the big black berries off the mulberry bushes near our mailbox while inside our mother would whistle along with the classical music station, stir pots of fragrant stews, and repose in her chair, howling out loud, a New Yorker open on her lap and a particular cartoon cutting her in half.

But the bits about her family, especially her mother, are a little hard to swallow. There is so much angst and tension between the two of them that it very nearly pushes the reader away. But like that car wreck you pass on the highway, you just can’t tear your eyes from.

Blood, Bones and Butter is full of life, full of passion. Her dedication to her work, to her restaurant, to her children, is unceasing. Her story, a little bittersweet, the narrative a bit confusing at times, but a very hearty, satisfying read.

This is my second read for the Foodies Read 2 Challenge 

For that seems to be how it is in Night and Day. In this London society where cupid’s arrows seem to have flown haphazardly. For Mary loves Ralph who loves Katherine who doesn’t love William who might love Cassandra and not Katherine (his fiancée).

And signals are crossed or missed entirely. And hands are wrung, sighs are sighed, walks are walked and lots of tea is made.

Things sort themselves out eventually and all seems fine and dandy except that there is an odd number in this equation. And that is poor Mary, who devotes her life to causes and who sort of becomes the reluctant counselor to all these lovelorn folks. Of course she herself is caught up in this love-line (so not a triangle or even a square or a circle because no one seems to love her back….awwww!) so she is the maker of tea and her flat the convenient drop-in place for the lovelorn and the confused. It is hard not to like her (especially her family and their amusing initial shyness with Ralph) and I just wish she were treated better.

As for Katherine, I was quite determined to boo and hiss at her, since I’m on Mary’s side and all that. But Woolf sneaks in these bits about how K has this secret love. An unspeakable atrocity as she is the granddaughter of some famous (now deceased) poet (who has a kind of cult status that has visitors calling at the house to see his writing desk and manuscripts).

When she was rid of the pretense of paper and pen, phrase-making and biography, she turned her attention in a more legitimate direction, though, strangely enough, she would rather have confessed her wildest dreams of hurricane and prairie than the fact that, upstairs, alone in her room, she rose early in the morning or sat up late at night to…work at mathematics.

Yes, a secret love for mathematics. That makes me want to forgive all her faults – and she has many. But it is hard because of Mary and her fondness for Ralph, who’s in love with Katherine. And Katherine is one who believes that love should be:

“Splendid as the waters that drop with resounding thunder from high ledges of rock, and plunge downwards into the blue depths of night, was the presence of love she dream, drawing into it every drop of the force of life, and dashing them all asunder in the superb catastrophe in which everything was surrendered, and nothing might be reclaimed. The man too, was some magnanimous hero, riding a great horse by the shore of the sea. They rode through forests together, they galloped the rim of the sea.

As for the male characters, I didn’t think much of them. William is written as too silly and pompous a character. And Ralph too angsty.

At one moment he exulted in the thought that Mary loved him; at the next, it seemed that he was without feeling for her; her love was repulsive to him. Now he felt urged to marry her at once; now to disappear and never see her again.

Night and Day might not be one of Woolf’s more lauded books but it was quite a treat to read.

This is my Classics read for the Mixing it Up challenge.

Wee reader had his usual awesome time at the library’s baby lapsit programme. Songs, storytime, playtime! And of course, picking up plenty of books for the both of us!

Sinner (Wayfarer Redemption, Book 4) – Sara Douglass
Yup more Sara Douglass!

The land of Tencendor has been united for more than forty years, thanks to Axis, who is the legendary Starman. He defeated Gorgrael and brought peace to the three races–and upon fulfilling his destiny, Axis and his consort Azhure retired to the ethereal sphere in the heavens, and ceded his authority to their son Caelum.

But the path of the son is not necessarily that of the father. Caelum is untried and has known nothing but peace during his lifetime. And while the three races seem to be at peace, there are undercurrents of jealousy and bitter memories buried just beneath the surface.

So when strange powers begin to manifest in their world, and threaten the destruction of all he holds dear, Caelum will have to find the strength to fight this threat–and to fight his mortal brother Drago, who is not as powerless as he appears to be. Something killed their sister, and Caelum knows Drago is the culprit–but the Supreme Ruler of the land must have proof, and Caelum has none.

Caelum desperately tries to juggle saving the world with proving his brother killed their sister, but time grows short and the demons are drawing near…

Pilgrim: Book Five of the Wayfarer Redemption – Sara Douglass

The Star Gate is destroyed and the Star Dance is dead. Icarii Enchanters, gods, and humans alike are helpless as the TimeKeeper Demons lay waste to Tencendor.

There must be hope left, but no one knows where to find it. Death lurks in every twist of the Maze, but only those who have the courage to endure death can learn the secrets of the ancient enemy.

Caelum SunSoar and his parents know that the only way is to discover the ancient secrets that lay trapped in the mountain Star Finger, and Faraday, martyred heroine, grows ever fearful — and ever bitter. Must she lose everything to the land?

Beggars in Spain – Nancy Kress

In a world where the slightest edge can mean the difference between success and failure, Leisha Camden is beautiful, extraordinarily intelligent … and one of an ever-growing number of human beings who have been genetically modified to never require sleep.

Once considered interesting anomalies, now Leisha and the other “Sleepless” are outcasts — victims of blind hatred, political repression, and shocking mob violence meant to drive them from human society … and, ultimately, from Earth itself.

But Leisha Camden has chosen to remain behind in a world that envies and fears her “gift” — a world marked for destruction in a devastating conspiracy of freedom … and revenge.

Hereville: How Mirka Got Her Sword – Barry Deutsch

Recommended by Buried in Print

Spunky, strong-willed eleven-year-old Mirka Herschberg isn’t interested in knitting lessons from her stepmother, or how-to-find-a-husband advice from her sister, or you-better-not warnings from her brother. There’s only one thing she does want: to fight dragons!

Granted, no dragons have been breathing fire around Hereville, the Orthodox Jewish community where Mirka lives, but that doesn’t stop the plucky girl from honing her skills. She fearlessly stands up to local bullies. She battles a very large, very menacing pig. And she boldly accepts a challenge from a mysterious witch, a challenge that could bring Mirka her heart’s desire: a dragon-slaying sword! All she has to do is find—and outwit—the giant troll who’s got it!

A delightful mix of fantasy, adventure, cultural traditions, and preteen commotion, Hereville will captivate middle-school readers with its exciting visuals and entertaining new heroine.

The Table Comes First: Family, France, and the Meaning of Food – Adam Gopnik
For the Foodies Challenge

Never before have we cared so much about food. It preoccupies our popular culture, our fantasies, and even our moralizing—“You still eat meat?” With our top chefs as deities and finest restaurants as places of pilgrimage, we have made food the stuff of secular seeking and transcendence, finding heaven in a mouthful. But have we come any closer to discovering the true meaning of food in our lives?

With inimitable charm and learning, Adam Gopnik takes us on a beguiling journey in search of that meaning as he charts America’s recent and rapid evolution from commendably aware eaters to manic, compulsive gastronomes. It is a journey that begins in eighteenth-century France—the birthplace of our modern tastes (and, by no coincidence, of the restaurant)—and carries us to the kitchens of the White House, the molecular meccas of Barcelona, and beyond. To understand why so many of us apparently live to eat, Gopnik delves into the most burning questions of our time, including: Should a Manhattanite bother to find chicken killed in the Bronx? Is a great vintage really any better than a good bottle of wine? And: Why does dessert matter so much?

Throughout, he reminds us of a time-honored truth often lost amid our newfound gastronomic pieties and certitudes: What goes on the table has never mattered as much to our lives as what goes on around the table—the scene of families, friends, lovers coming together, or breaking apart; conversation across the simplest or grandest board. This, ultimately, is who we are.

Following in the footsteps of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, Adam Gopnik gently satirizes the entire human comedy of the comestible as he surveys the wide world of taste that we have lately made our home. The Table Comes First is the delightful beginning of a new conversation about the way we eat now.

And for wee reader:

My Friend Rabbit – Eric Rohmann

All Fall Down – Helen Oxenbury

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? What would you suggest I read next?

See more Library Loot here.

And I’m back! For a few quick mini reviews. Because these are deserving books, which deserve to be blogged about and read. And unfortunately all I can manage right now are these short bits (among other fun things, feeding an unhappy baby oral antibiotics).

Uncle Montague’s Tales of Terror is such a delight. It would be the ideal RIP read, but reading it in the chilly wintry nights did just fine. Enchanting and endearing in that creepy sort of way. If you like Tim Burton movies, this book’s for you.

I was definitely in a sort of seasonal/winter-y mood (perhaps because it hardly feels like winter here?) and read the latest Flavia de Luce novel,  I Am Half-Sick of Shadows, which obviously is Christmas-themed. This time, the de Luce manor is being taken over by a film crew and as usual, Flavia comes across a dead body and starts her own investigation. As always, a delight to read. Best with a mug of hot chocolate (I love Trader Joe’s Sipping Chocolate!).

‘Richard Castle’s' Heat Wave was a fun read, a little silly since Castle is himself a fictional TV character. But it was odd how I could hear Castle’s (the darling Nathan Fillion) voice in my head as I read this book. Because it is really quite true to the TV series, just that it takes a lot longer to get through. Entertaining enough but I don’t think I will be continuing with this series.

A bowl of porridge – a hallmark of traditional Teochew cuisine – appeared. The water was just slightly milky, the grains of rice soft, yet still separate and not so soft that they were mushed together, as they often can be in lesser versions. The porridge was simple and clean – a lovely canvas for the subtle dishes that would follow. A giant steamed fish came prepared with silvers of ginger and swimming in a slightly sweet broth with tinges of the tomatoes and sour plums that had been steeped in it. A crunchy beggar’s purse erupted in an avalanche of diced chicken when sliced open. Perfectly fried prawn balls were crunchy outside and hot and juicy inside. Goose legs and wings were braised in sweet soy sauce to such softness that the meat was like cotton puffs on our tongues.

Being part Teochew myself, I salivated over the many Teochew and Singaporean dishes that Tan, who lives and works in the US (and blogs here), consumes and learns to make from her family in Singapore. I longed for more, much more. I got some, with my fill with her tales of making pineapple tarts, rice dumplings, duck soup. But to be honest, in the end I was a little disappointed.

With a myriad of food-related memoirs out there, it’s a tough market. This book’s hook – Singapore food. A rojak of Singapore food. There’s Chinese New Year pineapple tarts, duck soup, a Malay dish, and plenty of bread baking. Reading A Tiger in the Kitchen made me think of home, it made me think of my late grandmother, whom I would find sitting in the kitchen when we visited for Sunday dinners. ‘Mama’ I would greet her and nose around the dining table to check out what we were having for dinner (of course the kids ate at the plastic table on the front porch, not with the adults at the rosewood table). I would request for her kong bah (stewed pork belly with steamed buns) and prawn fritters for my birthdays. But what I miss most are her rice dumplings, orh nee and braised duck, the recipes of which have been lost forever.

Reading this book made me think of the wonderful times spent with my mum in  kitchen, helping her chop and wash and cook, helping her whack out the snowskin mooncakes from their wooden moulds. It’s been so long since I’ve had her mooncakes, her simple yet delicious quiche, her sayur lodeh (a vegetable curry). I can’t wait till August when she and my dad come to visit! Hopefully she won’t mind doing some cooking when she’s here! So in that respect, all good. A book that brings up such fond memories, that stirs up the appetite – what could be better?

But there was this sense of disconnect in A Tiger in the Kitchen. Tan’s from Singapore, but lives in the US. First a fashion writer, then a food writer. She starts out quite clueless but thanks to help from her family in Singapore, and her friends and ‘uncles’ in the US, she begins to learn to cook and bake. The book isn’t just about Singapore food, as Tan is fond of baking and breadmaking. And sometimes it’s a bit too back and forth. In Singapore, in the US, cooking Singapore food, baking bread. I mean I understand it’s not all about making mee siam and nasi padang, life in Singapore is very ‘rojak’, but it left me feeling like tighter editing might have come in handy. This book is also a story about her family. However I felt that while bits of her family are revealed, there is much more left unsaid. I can understand, Singapore is a small country, somehow it always seems like there are less than six degrees connecting each other, and I wouldn’t really want people to read about my life! So I kept having this impression that I was always just skimming the fat off the surface of the soup (yeah those food metaphors were just prepped and ready to be used). I wanted to plunge my spoon in deeper, to dig to the bottom of the soup bowl for all the good stuff, to learn more about her family, her passion for food.

I know photos can be a little overdone when it comes to memoirs/food-related books, but just to have a hint of the food in the recipes would be better, especially for those who are unfamiliar with Singapore food. And then there’s the cover. I really hate this whole ‘oriental’ rubbish. This is a book about food, so why the red cheongsam? It’s as if they searched ‘Asia’ or ‘Oriental’ and used the first image they found. Then added the chopsticks to signal that this book is not just ‘Oriental’, it is food-related. So why not a picture of food? While I don’t have pictures of duck soup and pineapple tarts and rice dumplings (oh actually I do have pictures of rice dumplings! see below) for you, here is some of the food I had in Singapore.

Chicken wings, fried vegetarian bee hoon, satay

Kaya (coconut jam) toast (with slabs of butter) and kopi (Singapore-style coffee – sweetened with condensed milk)

Orh nee (yam paste with pumpkin and gingko nuts)

(from bottom left) Nasi lemak, chwee kueh, soya bean milk, rice dumplings (bah zhang)

A Tiger in the Kitchen may have its flaws (which book doesn’t) but it did something that few books have. It made me long for home, for my family, for my food.

This is my first read for Foodies Read 2.

Because unlike most second books in trilogies, Enchanter (Wayfarer Redemption series book 2) really hooked me. The first book I was all, oh it’s English Breakfast Tea-ish. But the second book, it’s more like a punchy flat white. And it’s mainly because of Azhure. She is an intriguing one, of unknown origins, of supposed magical, mystical powers yet to be unleashed. Is she the Lover of the Prophecy and not Faraday? Douglass teases the reader with hints and suggestions at greatness to come, and I got pulled in. Page after page I read. Page after page I was part of Tencendor, cheering on Azhure, feeling sorry for Faraday, being irritated at Axis, hating that very one-sidedness of the evil Gorgrael, intrigued by the powerful yet treacherous WolfStar. Ok I still don’t like the covers though.

Book 3, StarMan, provided a decent conclusion. There were great battles, even more secrets unveiled, some rather creepy moments (I can’t really go into details without spoilers). But the ending was perhaps a little more anti-climatic than I was expecting! As I finished it, I wondered if that’s why there are three more books (albeit in a different but related trilogy, but also sometimes marketed as part of this series – I don’t know, I’m confused too).

A big part of this series for me were the two female leads, especially Azhure, although in the end she seemed a little too powerful, a little too magical, a little too much like fate had dropped all the wonders of the universe into her lap. The self-sacrificing Faraday becomes one of Azhure’s greatest friends and it is heartwarming that despite their initial grievances, that they come together and fight for what’s right.

Oh and the songs. The Star Dance (the music the stars make in the heavens), the songs that the Icarii Enchanters sing to bring about their magic, the songs that the trees sing. The Icarii sing to their unborn babies. We know not of these songs that are sung (no lyrics) but it would be a wonderful thing to behold, wouldn’t it? The Star Dance.

Aud Torvingen  is a hell of a character. She’s six feet tall of toughness, danger, ass-kicking, emotionally complex, Scandinavian blondness. A Norwegian expat living in Atlanta, Georgia, Torvingen consults for the police (she’s an ex-cop), works as a bodyguard, teaches self-defense, crafts her own furniture, tends her garden, and constantly thinks about the best way to kill someone.

And I lapped all this no-nonsense up. In a move uncharacteristic of me, I read my way straight through Nicola Griffith’s three Aud outings – The Blue Place, Stay, and Always. (Perhaps a new goal for 2012? Just read! That is, why save to savour? Why not savour now?!)

It is difficult to talk about the plots of these three books without spoilers. So essentially it’s a crime series. Not that Aud is a PI or anything, rather, these cases seem to sniff her out. So with most crime/mystery series, there are dead bodies and women of interest (both in terms of the case as well as romantic interest).

One of the biggest surprises that these books had for me were Griffith’s way with places. A very plenty surprise for an armchair traveler like me.  Aud travels home to Norway. It is gorgeous. Griffith makes me want to visit.

“It’s a land that doesn’t compromise. It’s snow, ice and darkness in the winter; and endless midnight sun, bright meadow flower and sweet green grass for two months in the summer. Black or white. On or off. Yes or no. It explains some of the way you react to what life throws at you, the pragmatic immediacy, the readiness – you never forget that there are trolls in the hills.”

I was especially taken with Vigeland Park, filled with sculptures by Gustav Vigeland such as this monolith.

Source

“‘Why do you suppose his work was so large?’ she said to herself as we descended the steps slowly. She stopped before the woman washing another woman’s hair. ‘It’s intimate, almost sexual, and yet quite ordinary. I suppose that’s what he was trying to say: everything is ordinary.’

‘He was saying everything in life is special. Every moment is a gift.’”

Source

This 80 acres park has 212 bronze and granite sculptures designed by Gustav Vigeland. I must say that this Wheel of Life is one of my favourites.

Griffith’s way with places makes me even want to visit North Carolina, a place that has not been on my list of must-sees. But she describes the woods in which Aud crafts her cabin so mesmerisingly, that I feel a desperate need to step outside, to stand under the shade of a big leafy tree (wrong season I know!), to inhale some fresh air.

“From the roof of my cabin I can see only forest, an endless canopy of pecan and hickory, ash and beech and sugar maple. Wind flows through the trees and down the mountain, and the clearing seems like nothing but a step in a great green waterfall. Even the freshly split shingles make me think of water. Cedar is an aromatic wood; warmed by the autumn sunlight of a late North Carolina afternoon, it smells ancient and exotic, like the spice-laden hold of a quinquereme of Nineveh. It would be easy to close my eyes and imagine a long ago ocean cut by oars – water whispering along the hull, the taste of spray…”

Hard as nails. I’m not sure if I’ve ever used that phrase before but it is exceptionally suited to Aud Torvingen (If there were a film version, I would imagine that Tilda Swinton would be quite suited to the part). But it’s not all about kicks and asses and ass-kicking, Aud is a character who grows, learns, develops, who eventually becomes a different person from the one you first imagine her to be. And yet she manages to stay true to herself. Aud is quite unforgettable.