Scrooges may complain about the ebullient excess celebrated in these rollicking pages, but most readers will greedily...
Australian by birth, Parisian by marriage, film critic and biographer Baxter (We’ll Always Have Paris, 2005, etc.) makes an amiable, jocular companion in this account of preparing a large Christmas dinner for a house full of French in-laws.
The final two-thirds of his frisky text deals with the peripatetic preparation of a specific meal, though in these same chapters, as earlier, the author digresses often and smoothly into reflections on Christmases past, in Australia and elsewhere. Baxter indulges in some occasional, informal cultural anthropology, for example, comparing the Gallic notion of sin with that of the American. “Providing it is conceived with imagination and carried off with flair,” he writes, the French regard sin as “evidence of endurance, of survival, of life.” He comments on the Gallic passion for the Christmas holiday (everything is closed; everyone is with family) and observes that, contrary to what readers of Julia Child may think, French cooking is essentially simple. Baxter rehearses his own evolution as a cook—in early manhood, he’d cooked for his girlfriends for reasons of economy but discovered its powerful aphrodisiac qualities—and confesses that he’d never much cared for Christmas as a lad (he preferred reading). He chronicles his courtship of his second wife and offers anecdotes about his writing career. But the meat in this pie is Baxter’s account of the Christmas when he cooked a piglet with its skin still in place, accompanied by oysters and fresh fruit. He prepared it Cajun-style, which made finding the right wine a challenge. His in-laws, not spice-lovers, had to be told about the French connection between Cajuns and Acadians before they licked their platters clean.
Scrooges may complain about the ebullient excess celebrated in these rollicking pages, but most readers will greedily consume the succulent narrative.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-06-156233-4
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Perennial/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2008
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
