Weekend picks for book lovers
What should you read this weekend? USA TODAY’s picks for book lovers include a new memoir by Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi.
Love, Loss, and What We Ate by Padma Lakshmi; Ecco, 336 pp.; non-fiction
“Since I can remember, people have asked me the same question,” writes Padma Lakshmi in her new memoir. “How do I eat so much and stay slim? The answer is simple: a lot of hard work.”
Throughout her new book, the Indian-born model, cookbook author and Top Chef host makes it clear that, in spite of her ravishing beauty, little has come to her without effort.
If male attention is a predictable exception, it’s also proven something of a double-edged sword. Love, Loss begins with an account of Lakshmi’s courtship by and marriage (2004-2007) to the celebrated writer Salman Rushdie.
She recalls her struggles to fit in as a child shuttling between India and New York, and later as a teen whose ethnicity puzzles California neighbors, and a young model with an arm left scarred in a car accident. There are other men, among them venture capitalist Adam Dell, the father of Lakshmi’s daughter, Krishna, 6; and the late businessman Teddy Forstmann, whom Lakshmi remembers for his tenderness toward both her and Krishna.
USA TODAY says *** stars out of four. “Appealing.”
Padma Lakshmi dishes on 'Love, Loss, and What We Ate'
The Big Rewind by Libby Cudmore; William Morrow, 256 pp.; fiction
Jett, our broke Brooklynite heroine who moves in a world of impeccably cool vegans, discovers her neighbor’s corpse in this debut mystery.
USA TODAY says *** stars. “A hipster cozy! …funny.”
'Firebrand' celebrates a friendship that made a difference
The Firebrand and the First Lady: Portrait of a Friendship by Patricia Bell-Scott; Knopf, 360 pp.; non-fiction
The story of Pauli Murray, an introspective African-American writer turned militant activist, and her friendship and political alliance with first lady Eleanor Roosevelt.
USA TODAY says ***½ stars. Written with “grace, compassion and diligent attention to detail.”
Stephen Harrigan's 'Friend' delivers a very human Lincoln
A Friend of Mr. Lincoln by Stephen Harrigan; Knopf, 411 pp.; fiction
In this novel set in Springfield, Ill., Harrigan takes the measure of the great man through the eyes of Cage Weatherby, a fictional poet who first meets Abraham Lincoln during the Black Hawk War of 1832.
USA TODAY says ***½ stars. “An emotionally rich and exquisitely poignant work of historical fiction that breathes intricate life back into the 16th President of the United States.”
Math is a problem in Ethan Canin's 'Almanac'
A Doubter's Almanac by Ethan Canin; Random House, 551 pp.; fiction
The story of an emotionally remote theoretical mathematician, as seen through the eyes of his deeply wounded adult son.
USA TODAY says *** stars. “Convincing…utterly unique.”
Contributing reviewers: Elysa Gardner, Charles Finch, Gene Seymour, James Endrst, Eliot Schrefer