I was pleasantly surprised by your book choice this month, but all the books looked good so it would have been a good month regardless. And the one positive of COVID-19 is that many of us have more time to read (assuming you’re not being driven crazy by having the kids at home all the time).
Before we get to the results, I of course need to include another cookbook since French cookery is so divine! If you’re in the US or France, you’ve likely heard of Jacques Pepin, a legendary, award-winning French chef who moved to the US a few decades ago. This particular cookbook includes his best 700 recipes from his six-decade career! There’s also an accompanying video which comes with the book demonstrating his techniques.
“Jacques Pépin has earned a reputation as a champion of simplicity. His recipes are classics. They find the shortest, surest route to flavor, avoiding complicated techniques.
Now, in a book that celebrates his life in food, the world’s most famous cooking teacher winnows his favorite recipes from the thousands he has created, streamlining them even further. Essential Pépin spans the many styles of Jacques’s cooking: homey country French, haute cuisine, fast food Jacques-style, and fresh contemporary American dishes.”
One of the best purchases I made as there’s such a vast number of delicious recipes included.
But now onto the voting results…
WHAT BOOK ARE WE READING?
Dubbed the “Harry Potter of France”
A National Indie Bestseller
“Dabos’s darkly enchanting debut, a French bestseller, employs vibrant characters, inventive worldbuilding, and a sophisticated plot that will dazzle readers.” - Publishers Weekly
“Lose yourself in the fantastic world of the arks and in the company of unforgettable characters in this French runaway hit.
Plain-spoken, headstrong Ophelia cares little about appearances. Her ability to read the past of objects is unmatched in all of Anima and she possesses the ability to travel through mirrors, a skill passed down to her from previous generations. Her idyllic life is disrupted, however, when she is promised in marriage to Thorn, a taciturn and influential member of a distant clan. An unforgettable heroine in a rich and bountiful universe filled with intrigue and suspense, Ophelia must leave all she knows behind and follow her fiancé to Citaceleste, the capital of a cold, icy ark known as the Pole, where danger lurks around every corner and nobody can be trusted. There, in the presence of her inscrutable future husband, Ophelia slowly realizes that she is a pawn in a political game that will have far-reaching ramifications not only for her but for her entire world.
Adult readers who gravitated toward the intricate world-building of Harry Potter or reveled in the dark trickeries of Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass will find themselves ensnared by the enchantments of A Winter's Promise.”
2018 Amazon Best Sci-Fi/Fantasy Book
One of Entertainment Weekly's 10 Best YA Books of 2018
Publishers Weekly's Best YA Book of the Year
Longlisted for Irish prize Great Reads Award
(Group read suggestion from Beth McCrea, book club co-founder.)
Happy reading!