Kitchen Confidential

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain

I avoided this book for several months for several reasons. Okay, just ONE reason. This is the guy who eats EVERYTHING and anything, right? I was in fear of reading this book and never wanting to eat anything ever again.

Instead, the opposite happened. This book hooked me in from the first page - fantastic writing, it was like guy was hanging out in my head from the very first sentence - and made me want to eat. To hop on a plane and check out these places, this food he was talking about.

This book is going down as my favorite for 2009. The dark horse, go figure.

Pub. Date: May 2000

Synopsis: When Chef Anthony Bourdain wrote "Don't Eat Before You Read This" in The New Yorker, he spared no one's appetite, revealing what goes on behind the kitchen door. In Kitchen Confidential, he expanded that appetizer into a deliciously funny, delectable shocking banquet that lays out his 25 years of sex, drugs, and haute cuisine.
From his first oyster in the Gironde to the kitchen of the Rainbow Room atop Rockefeller Center, from the restaurants of Tokyo to the drug dealers of the East Village, from the mobsters to the rats, Bourdain's brilliantly written, wild-but-true tales make the belly ache with laughter.

Recommended Reading:
Nasty Bits by Anthony Bourdain
Cook's Tour by Anthony Bourdain
Bone in the Throat by Anthony Bourdain
Heat by Bill Buford

Temptation

The kids and I went to the library today. Usually at the library I only check out movies. I have 50+ books on my TBR shelf at home (courtesy of paperbackswap), I don't really have time to read a library book on top of everything else. Today my original intention was to check out Angels & Demons by Dan Brown as my friend seems to have lost the copy she planned to loan me.

I was sidetracked by the New Books shelf. Immediately a large volume grabbed me off my feet, shook me up and left me standing there breathless. An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabaldon. How could I not check it out? There were so many reasons why I should, that the book was in my basket before I could really think twice about it. The book is on my wishlist, but considering my current position of 523 and the book has a whopping 814 pages... it'll be awhile before I see the copy from pbs. I also have an eleven (ELEVEN!!) day vacation beginning mid-week during which I will need something to do with insomniac self because I WON'T be working.

I am so excited to read this book, I cracked it open while I was waiting for the kids to pick their take-home reads. As always, DG starts the book right in the middle of the action and it's awesome. It's my goal for the weekend to finish Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain (which has been amazing) and be able to start *ahem* the next installment of DG's Outlander Series.

Vanishing Acts

Vanishing Acts by Jodi Picoult

My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I always expect surprises from Jodi Picoult's books and 'Vanishing Acts' was no exception. A very enjoyable book. I had difficulty with some of the relationship responses that happened, it seemed unrealistic at times.

Pub. Date: November 2005

Synopsis: Delia Hopkins has led a charmed life. Raised in rural New Hampshire by her widowed father, Andrew, she now has a young daughter, a handsome fiancé, and her own search-and-rescue bloodhound, which she uses to find missing persons. But as Delia plans her wedding, she is plagued by flashbacks of a life she can't recall. And then a policeman knocks on her door, revealing a secret that changes the world as she knows it.
What happens when you learn you are not who you thought you were? When the people you've loved and trusted suddenly change before your eyes? When getting your deepest wish means giving up what you've always taken for granted? Vanishing Acts explores how life as we know it might not turn out the way we imagined; how doing the right thing could mean doing the wrong thing; and how the memory we thought had vanished could return as a threat.