The Versions Of Us
By Laura Barnett (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
Actress Gwyneth Paltrow did it entertainingly in the movie Sliding Doors. Author Kate Atkinson did it brilliantly in Life After Life. And now UK journalist Laura Barnett has borrowed the same device for her debut novel The Versions Of Us, looking at the way a single event can change a life. There are three versions of Eva Edelstein's and Jim Taylor's story. Each begins in 1958 when they are students at Cambridge University. Eva is cycling when a dog rushes into her path. In one version she swerves, her tyre runs over a rusty nail and is punctured. In one, she falls off. And in another, the dog darts away at the last minute. Jim happens to be walking towards her and offers help. The way Eva responds to him will lead them to different futures. Essentially, this is a love story with a lot of near misses and paths not taken. It's a tremendous juggling act for Barnett and a bit of a brain workout for the reader since you must keep tabs on which version you're reading and who Jim and Eva are to each other in it.
Troubling Love
By Elena Ferrante (Text)
Elena Ferrante is an enigma. She's the Neapolitan author of highly wrought stories about women but little is known about her. She refuses interviews and there are no photographs. Despite this, her work has developed a following and now her first novella, Troubling Love, has been republished. It's an unsettling story, a mystery in which Naples, a city where passions always seem at boiling point, has a starring role. Delia has come home because her mother has died in sinister circumstances; drowned in the sea clothed only in a fancy bra. As she tries to discover the truth about what has happened, Delia becomes caught up in old feuds, family secrets and memories of her childhood. There is an increasingly hallucinatory quality to the prose, a vulgarity and grotesqueness, too. Ferrante's novels are regarded as brilliant. Gritty and confronting, they are about an underbelly of southern Italy tourists rarely see.
MasterChef: The Masters At Home
(Absolute Press)
This cookbook collects the recipes of the real master chefs, not the winners of TV shows but the big stars of the restaurant world, people like Ferran Adria of Spain, Sydney's Tetsuya Wakuda, London's Ruth Rogers and our own Peter Gordon. The idea is they are sharing the secrets of the dishes they like to eat at home rather than the more complex creations they serve customers. So, from Ferran Adria, the king of molecular gastronomy, comes a simple chilled soup of watermelon, tomato and basil plus a wonderful twist on a crema Catalana for dessert. There are 32 top chefs included, with a short intro about each that includes their secret food haunt and three recipes. I can only imagine how hard it was for these culinary geniuses to edit down their favourite dishes so severely but the result is a treat; a real bible for anyone who wants things to be more exciting in their kitchen but not necessarily more complicated. Basically, it's foodie heaven in book form. My favourite quote is from restaurateur Joe Bastianich: "A meal without wine is called breakfast."
Etta And Otto And Russell And James
By Emma Hooper (Fig Tree)
Etta's greatest unfulfilled wish, living in the rolling farmland of Saskatchewan, is to see the sea. And so, at the age of 82 she gets up very early one morning, takes a rifle, some chocolate and her best boots, and begins walking the 3218km to the coast. Otto, her husband, waits patiently at home with only his memories. The neighbour, Russell, also remembers, and he still loves Etta as much as he did 50 years earlier, before she married Otto. This story follows Etta from the time she leaves home as a young woman; Otto as he leaves his family and their farm to fight in the war; and Russell as he stays at home and falls in love with Etta. In case you're wondering about the James in the book title, he meets up with Etta on her trek to the ocean. A delightful story.
• Review by Tracey Lawton of The Village Bookshop in Matakana.
