May - Heartburn
Nora Ephron
“I look out the window and I see the lights and the skyline and the people on the street rushing around looking for action, love, and the world's greatest chocolate chip cookie, and my heart does a little dance.”
Our first suggestion from a guest!
As we were researching the book for our next evening, a novel we simply could not put off was suggested to us by a Cooking the Books guest: Nora Ephron’s semi autobiographical Heartburn. I had watched Sleepless in Seattle without being completely aware of the extent of Ephron’s talent.
I had the joy of listening to the audiobook narrated by Meryl Streep who completely brought the character to life. However when I handed the copy to my mother, she made the mistake of trying to read it on the train and kept bursting out laughing at every other sentence, so she decided it was more sensible to finish this truly hilarious novel at home…
“I always read the last page of a book first so that if I die before I finish I'll know how it turned out.”
This book club event we chose to serve a starter of salad with the quintessential vinaigrette sauce, followed by the Linguine alla Checca. Of course the dessert was the iconic key lime pie!
There was also some discussion surrounding the wines that were chosen for each course to add another dimension to the evening (and help be more inclusive of anyone who didn’t get to read the whole book).
The focus of Cooking the Books really is on bringing people together in a relaxed, jovial environment where no one is under pressure to give lofty insight into the minutiae of the book of the month. It’s all about friendly conversation, the delicious food that piques your interest in the books you read, and simply doing something a little different with your evening.