Staff Picks by Tag

Staff Pick Badge
The Book of Difficult Fruit: Arguments for the Tart, Tender, and Unruly (with recipes) By Kate Lebo Cover Image
$18.00
ISBN: 9781250829474
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Picador - April 12th, 2022

Personal essays meets learning new things meets fruit recipes 

Even though these fruits may be difficult, they are worth it. Spokane author, Kate Lebo, will make you want to get your hands on all of the pomegranate to make a molasses or a face mask (or, of course, eat as is). 


Review by Emily

Staff Pick Badge
The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket By Benjamin Lorr Cover Image
$19.00
ISBN: 9780553459418
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Avery - November 9th, 2021

Benjamin Lorr fundamentally changed the way I think not only about food as commodity, but about retail, period. (Everything you touch, wear, or eat has spent long hours in the back of a truck!) Lorr isn't disgusted by it all, either; in the author's electric language, top-notch writing that engages every sense, the supermarket is a place of worship (think DeLillo's famous grocery store scenes in 'White Noise'). Lorr dedicates a chapter to each part of the supply chain, in all of its confusion and horror—yet still maintains the belief that retail is a font of meaning-making and community. It’s not just about groceries, but about the way we develop identity through what we buy. I can't stop raving about this book.


Review by Spencer R.

Staff Pick Badge
Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City By Jane Wong Cover Image
$27.95
ISBN: 9781953534675
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Tin House Books - May 16th, 2023

 

If you liked Crying in H-Mart, give this one a try. It also deals with food and the expression of love through food, and reads like a love letter to the author's mother. But each author has a different story to tell, and each does it magnificently in their own way. Wong is a true poet - in the words of her own brother, "she says things differently." This book stretches the possibilities of storytelling, touching all the pressure points of fear, grief, rage, etc, while showing how all of these become smaller or more manageable when you have community and multiple forms of love around you. Read also if you are a fan of bell hooks - Wong expands hooks' idea of platonic love as the best model of all other kinds. This is just a beautiful, tender, and shining memoir, one of a kind.


Review by Marii

Staff Pick Badge
Motherthing By Ainslie Hogarth Cover Image
$17.00
ISBN: 9780593467022
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Vintage - September 27th, 2022

Everything starts normal enough, you know, a hypothetical hot tub full of shit kind of normal. But then everything begins to ooze and build and she just wants to be the perfect wife, the perfect woman. Kill the bacteria, save your family. Buy the healthy snacks, save your family. Do whatever you can, save your family. Enjoy with jellied salmon, Chicken à la King, and a wine cooler or five. A quirky, gruesome, fresh horror that will rival the classics.
 
The trashier (in a good way) cousin of A Certain Hunger and the 60's housewife sister of Nightbitch


Review by Emily

Staff Pick Badge
Antoni: Let's Do Dinner By Antoni Porowski Cover Image
$30.00
ISBN: 9780358395324
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Harvest - September 14th, 2021

Antoni from Queer Eye brings us into his home, inviting us to do dinner with him & his friends (like Gigi Hadid). The recipes are all straightforward & delicious, and easy to imbue with your own signature twists. Lots of easy ways to shake up your menu.



Staff Pick Badge
An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace By Tamar Adler, Alice Waters (Foreword by) Cover Image
By Tamar Adler, Alice Waters (Foreword by)
$17.00
ISBN: 9781439181881
Availability: On our shelves now at one or more of our stores
Published: Scribner - June 19th, 2012

Need to learn to cook? This book will teach you. Lesson one: How to Boil Water.

And if you know how to cook read this anyways - it makes the tedium of daily cooking feel like magic.


Review by Allie