The Book of Salt - Softcover

Truong, Monique

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099455455 ISBN 13: 9780099455455

Publisher: Vintage, 2004

Synopsis

In a compelling novel that takes the reader on a strange journey from Indochina to Paris, the Vietnamese cook for Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas reveals his own fascinating story-Paris, 1934. Binh has accompanied his employers to the station for their departure to America. His own destination is unclear: will he go with his 'Mesdames', stay in France, or return to his native Vietnam? Binh fled his homeland in disgrace, leaving behind his malevolent charlatan of a father and his self-sacrificing mother. For five years, he has been the personal cook at the famous apartment on the rue de Fleurs. Binh is a lost soul, an exile and an alien, a man of musings, memories and possibly lies- Tastes, oceans, sweat, tears - The Book of Salt is a an inspired novel about food and exile, love and betrayal.

About this title

Review:

"It is beautifully written, a cooking up of love and self to feed the devouring appetites of Gerturde Stein and Alice B. Toklas that is nothing less than a masterpiece of delicate and -naturally- existentialist hedonism." (Andro Linklater The Spectator)

"The Book of Salt reminded me of how thrilling really fine writing can be, and how rarely one sees it" (Sarah Waters)

From the Publisher:

A sharply subtle literary feast: the Vietnamese cook to Gertrude Stein and Alice B.Toklas reveals his fascinating story in a compelling novel that takes the reader on a strange journey from Indo China to Paris in the ‘30s

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0099455455
• ISBN 13: 9780099455455
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272