Book Review – Page 10 – Berryville Book Buzz

John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup (2018)

The rise and fall of Elizabeth Holmes has been in the news a lot lately. I must confess I was busy with grad school when the one-time whiz kid of Silicon Valley first rocketed to fame in the 2010s. So, I missed all the initial glowing coverage and attention lavished on the Stanford dropout who created Theranos, a multi-billion-dollar biotech startup that promised to change the way health care worked in America, and was lauded as the next Steve Jobs. Consequently, when Holmes and Theranos were finally outed as frauds in a shocking investigation by a Wall Street Journal reporter, I didn’t pay much attention to the coverage then either.

But after hearing a lot of buzz about Bad Blood, the book about Theranos that was written by the investigative reporter who brought the whole scheme tumbling down, I was intrigued enough to request we purchase it for the library. And I’m so glad I did–this is a wild read and an incredibly engrossing one at that. I had trouble putting the book down. (Thanks so much to Julie for adding it to the collection!)

Cookbook Corner: Quick and Easy

In honor of our Books, Spice, and Everything Nice theme (and spice club!), we’ll be doing a monthly round-up of our cookbooks. We have a really nice and extensive collection, but it’s easy to get lost in the sheer number of them. Hopefully these posts help! For September, we’ll be focusing on cookbooks that help you get dinner on the table when you’re pressed for time and ideas.

Book Buzz: Scottish Fantasy Islands, Commuting, the Weather, Old West Crime, Seafaring Tales, and Housewife Suspense

Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For August, we’re looking at an atmospheric fantasy romance set in Scotland, a celebration of friendship among commuters, a cute romance set at a news station, an engrossing anthology of Westerns with a side of mystery, two fascinating tales of real-life adventure on the high seas, and an audiobook suspense novel about catty rich housewives.

Cookbook Corner: Back to Culinary School

In honor of our Books, Spice, and Everything Nice theme (and spice club!), we’ll be doing a monthly round-up of our cookbooks. We have a really nice and extensive collection, but it’s easy to get lost in the sheer number of them. Hopefully these posts help! Not so much due to our monthly spice fenugreek as our local kids going back to school this month, for August, we’ll be focusing on comprehensive cookbooks that you can use as your own personal culinary textbooks.

Book Buzz: Gossip-Fueled Mysteries, Organized Crime Sagas, Unwitting Romances, Rural Medicine, and Literary Science Fiction

Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For July, we’re looking at two very different mysteries, a South-Asian-by-way-of-Canada revamp of You’ve Got Mail, nonfiction about Arkansas country doctors, and a companion novel to A Visit to the Goon Squad.

Edna Lewis’s The Taste of Country Cooking (2006)

When I was profiling Southern cookbooks back in March, Vanessa from Food in Books suggested The Taste of Country Cooking. When Vanessa recommends something, I pay attention, so I immediately requested we purchase the book and add it to the collection. In fact, I liked the book so much that I bought a personal copy for myself. Thanks so much to Vanessa for the wonderful suggestion and to Julie for adding Edna Lewis’s book to our holdings!

Cookbook Corner: French

In honor of our Books, Spice, and Everything Nice theme (and spice club!), we’ll be doing a monthly round-up of our cookbooks. We have a really nice and extensive collection, but it’s easy to get lost in the sheer number of them. Hopefully these posts help! In honor of our July spice nutmeg, we’ll be focusing on French cookbooks this month.

Book Buzz: Historical Fiction, Once, Twice, Thrice; Literary Science Fiction; Turmeric; and Space Race Rom Coms

Every month, we’re profiling new-ish releases that are getting critical and commercial buzz. For June, we’re looking at historical fiction set during the Great Depression, the Russian Revolution, and World War II; Emily St. John Mandel’s newest book; a cookbook solely devoted to this month’s spice; and a rom com that pairs an astronaut with a movie star.

Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko

When Sunja is born in the 1910s in Yeongdo, a small fishing village, in what is now South Korea, she has no expectation of ever leaving her hometown. Her parents, including her kindly but disabled father Hoonie, run a boardinghouse that largely caters to local fishermen. It seems inevitable that Sunja, as her parents’ only surviving child, will also spend her entire life in Yeongdo running the family boardinghouse.

However, as a teenager, Sunja migrates to Japan to start a new life, as many Koreans did during this time when Korea was a Japanese colony. This decision, made largely to avoid the intense shame she will face in her hometown for her out-of-wedlock pregnancy and connected to marriage to a virtual stranger to save face, touches off a family saga spanning decades that examines the experiences of Zainichi, Japan’s Korean population. As with many Zainichi, Sunja and her family find themselves experiencing intense discrimination in Japan and must navigate finding their way in a country that is technically home but doesn’t feel like it.

Cookbook Corner: Kids in the Kitchen

In honor of our Books, Spice, and Everything Nice theme (and spice club!), we’ll be doing a monthly round-up of our cookbooks. We have a really nice and extensive collection, but it’s easy to get lost in the sheer number of them. Hopefully these posts help! To help celebrate school being out and all the kids we have at the library for summer programs, we’ll be focusing on cookbooks for kids this month.

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