It's Monday, Monday

What are you reading this week?

  

Join Sheila at Book Journeys to find out what the big, wide world of blogging is also reading this week.

I feel much lighter of heart now that my sad chunkster, Testament of Youth from the last month is finished & reviewed (below).

To say that I now need something more light-hearted is an understatement. And as luck would have it, the perfect book fell into my lap a couple of days ago.

Yes Please by Amy Poehler should do the trick!

In Amy Poehler’s highly anticipated first book, Yes Please, 

she offers up a big juicy stew of personal stories, funny bits on sex and love 

and friendship and parenthood and real life advice (some useful, some not so much), 

like when to be funny and when to be serious. 

Powered by Amy’s charming and hilarious, biting yet wise voice,  

Yes Please is a book is full of words to live by.

Thanks to last week's It's Monday meme I discovered that Wensen & Fourth Street Review are hosting a Stephen King reading month called King's March. It's still not too late to join if, like me, you have some King's lurking on your TBR pile.

Mr Books highly recommended 11/22/63 to me and given my predilection for time-slip stories & JFK, it seems like an obvious win-win book choice for me.

Life can turn on a dime—or stumble into the extraordinary, as it does for Jake Epping, a high school English teacher in a Maine town. 

While grading essays by his GED students, Jake reads a gruesome, enthralling piece penned by janitor Harry Dunning: fifty years ago, Harry somehow survived his father’s sledgehammer slaughter of his entire family. 

Jake is blown away . . . but an even more bizarre secret comes to light when Jake’s friend Al, owner of the local diner, enlists Jake to take over the mission that has become his obsession—to prevent the Kennedy assassination. How? By stepping through a portal in the diner’s storeroom, and into the era of Ike and Elvis, of big American cars, sock hops, and cigarette smoke. . . . 

Finding himself in warmhearted Jodie, Texas, Jake begins a new life. But all turns in the road lead to a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald. The course of history is about to be rewritten . . . and become heart-stoppingly suspenseful.

The only problem I have with this book is the date.

In Australia we always write the date DD/MM/YY. 

Everytime I see this title my mind automatically says, "the 11th of ......what, we only have 12 months, not 22? what the? Is Stephen King messing with my head already? No! oh, it's American, so that means the month is first, so it reads November the 22nd, 1963! And means the same as 22nd November, 1963. Or 22/11/63 to be more Aussie. Got it now! Phew!"

And just in, a copy of Anatolia: Adventures in Turkish Cooking has found its lovely way into my home enticing me with gorgeous places to visit and yummy aromas. Based on the menu at one of my favourite local restaurants, Efendy, I can't wait to try some of them myself!

Anatolia is a richly illustrated, entertaining and informative exploration of the regional cooking culture of Turkey. Turkish-born chef Somer Sivrioglu and co-author David Dale re-imagine the traditions of Turkish cooking, presenting recipes ranging from the grand banquets of the Ottoman empire to the spicy snacks of Istanbul's street stalls. In doing so they explain their take on the classics and reveal the surrounding rituals, myths, jokes and folk wisdom of both the old and new Turkey.

More than 150 dishes are featured, and images of the recipes are complemented by specially commissioned photographs shot on location in Turkey. Feature spreads on local Turkish chefs and producers and their specialities add a fascinating layer of interest and flavour.

Somer Sivrioglu grew up in Instanbul and moved to Sydney when he was twenty-five. He now runs the extremely popular Efendy restaurant in Balmain, where he draws on a multitude of cultural influences to recreate the food traditions of his homeland.

David Dale is an Australian political journalist, commentator on popular culture, and food and travel writer. In his earlier books, David analysed how Italian cooking charmed the world. He's convinced that 'Turkish is going to be the next international phenomenon and Somer the next Ottolenghi'.

Happy Reading!