Kitchens of the Great Midwest

By J. Ryan Stradal

This is another book I picked up solely based on the cover. It's so beautiful and inviting, and clearly says: this is about women and food. In fact, I was a bit disappointed when I found out the author is not a woman. But my disappointment dissolved as I kept reading. Each chapter is told from someone else's perspective. Sometimes years apart. But there are a couple of common threads: one is food, of course, and the other is a character, Eva, whose story this is after all. Though each chapter has its own hero. In the last chapter, most of them come together, sort of. [312 pp.]

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Henderson the Rain King

By Saul Bellow

The story of Henderson, who, despite his age, still has some coming-of-age to do. And despite his riches and formidable physique, is very restless. This restlessness brings him to Africa, where he becomes the Rain King of a tribe that is quite secluded from the West, yet he befriends their leader, who has quite extensive Western education.

This book took me a long time to complete. I started it before leaving to Israel, whereupon I had to return it to the library, because someone had reserved the only copy of it they have. When I came back, I had to wait until the book is returned by the other people who had reserved it, so it was at least 6 weeks in between reading the first 100 pages and the rest. [330 pp.]

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Death Comes to the Archbishop

By Willa Cather

I don't believe I didn't put it down in here when I finished reading it! It was a few months ago...

Anyway, unlike most of her other novels I read, this book is not about women, but rather men. Old religious men. Well, I guess they weren't always old. It was interesting nonetheless. It has beautiful descriptions of the New Mexico, which I am not completely familiar with, especially not the way it looked back then, in the 19th century. It also has interesting characters and stories of their lives, which are somewhat based on the actual lives of the main two characters. [297 pp.]

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A House Full of Daughters (A memoir of seven generations)

By Juliet Nicolson

A very intimate look into the lives of seven generations of a famous family to which the author belongs, focusing on the daughters of the family. I was not familiar with the family, and was solely attracted to the book because of the cover and the intriguing title. It was nice to learn about the family, and through it, about parts of history of England and the US in the time frame presented. It was also interesting to see repetitions and breaks from repetition in the different generations' acts and behavior, and the progress made in society throughout the century and a half of the story. [326pp.]

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Summer

By Edith Wharton

The story of Charity Royall, a young woman who feels out of place, the summer of thoughtful romance she has with Lucious Harney, and the consequences of this affair. [255 pp. (incl. introduction)]

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Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

By Christopher Moore

This is a funny tale, trying to fill in the gap found in the new testament. As a young teenager, Josh (Jesus) and Biff go on a journey to find the tree wise men who visited Mary when Jesus was born. Josh just wants to know what he's supposed to do. In the process, they find the divine spark, bacon, and judo (JewDoh). Despite the obvious fictionality, the amount of research that went into writing this book is quite impressive. [444 pp.]

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Last Mikveh in Siberia [Hebrew]

By Eshkol Nevo

Read this book while in Israel. It was very engaging, as all of his books that I've read so far. It tells the story of one fictional town with a high concentration of resting (i.e. dead and buried) righteous people (tzadikim). It's actually a collection of a number of intermingled love stories of people living in the town, nearby it, or who have come from far away to it. [240 pp.]

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