Amazon.com
Tales of family dysfunction have become so commonplace that a postcard witticism suggests that a conference for children of functional families would be sparsely attended. Certainly Clea Simon, whose two older siblings were gripped by schizophrenia in their teens, wouldn't be there. She lays out a bleak, affecting story of growing up in a family where the spotlight necessarily shone on the insistent dissociations of a brother she remembers as once gentle and brilliant and a sister whose screeching, violent terrors sent young Simon scrambling for safety. Cogent explanations of mental illness and slices of therapy interweave with Simon's stories and those of similarly besieged families and siblings who must dismantle huge emotional barricades in order to live fully as adults. Sometimes this mix is uneasy, such as when a professionally cool distance too swiftly replaces the white heat of painful memories.
Book Description
In classic books such as Girl, Interrupted and When Rabbit Howls, the mentally ill depict their own harrowing worlds. In Mad House we have an account of the devastating effects of mental illness on the lives of those who share their world--the healthy siblings of those afflicted. Clea Simon was shattered when her older brother, Daniel, a freshman at Harvard, began hearing voices, making it impossible for him to function. He later committed suicide. Schizophrenia next claimed her sister, Katherine, who has moved from one institution to another after refusing any help from her family. Simon, who spoke with hundreds of other siblings of the mentally ill and with experts in the field, confronts the issues healthy siblings face, from guilt (Why do I deserve to be okay?) to fear (Will illness claim me or my children next?) to anger at being neglected by parents overwhelmed by the needs of the mad child. Part memoir, part practical guide, Mad House is a compelling and compassionate book destined to help many people come to terms, as Simon has, with the unique pain of living with a sibling's mental illness.
Customer Reviews:
Astounding!.......2007-09-07
My older brother carries a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. I could easily relate to the author's family dynamics and the effect that her siblings' mental health conditions had on her family. This book combines the author's personal experiences juxtaposed with research and reports from others who have siblings diagnosed with a mental health condition.
This book also helped me better understand my own family's dysfunction, why I relate to people and situations in particular ways, and it allowed me to forgive myself for some of the ways in which I treated my brother. I cannot recommend this book enough for anyone who has a member of their family diagnosed with a mental illness or provides family therapy. Reading this book helped me to gain insights into myself and into my family. It's a must read!
madhouse.......2005-11-09
When Clea Simon was growing up, her otherwise pleasant childhood was marred by odd outbursts and eccentric frightening behavior of her older brother and sister, both of whom would be diagnosed with schizophrenia. Simon, an intelligent and resourceful young girl turned to friends, books and fantasy games to distance herself from the chaos in her home. When she became an adolescent, her brother was hospitalized for mental illness, and she put pressure on herself to be the good, high-achieving child in the family. She was accepted into Harvard and on the outside looked like a wholly successful, confident person. However, years of suppressing her fears about her siblings began to take its toll, and she decided to enter therapy in order to find out who, apart from a high-achiever, she really was. Mad House is not just her story, however, but the many others' who she interviewed and whose accounts are smoothly woven into the book. It will almost certainly reassure readers with mentally ill siblings that they aren't alone.
I cried when I read it...........2004-09-03
My brothers aren't schizophrenic, like Ms. Simon's siblings. They are autistic, however, and the impact of their condition on our family dynamic was much the same. I am the only normal one of three children, and during my life I've felt rage, grief, loneliness, and the dreaded "I-wish-they-would-die-and-free-us-from-this-illness". Because of my brothers I have problems with intimacy and my single greatest fear is that I will bear a child with autism.
The guilt that accompanies my feelings is overwhelming. Ms. Simon's book showed me that I'm not alone, that my feelings aren't illegimate, and that a sort of emotional peace can be had when there's no cure (or even effective treatment) in sight. Thank you for writing this book--I needed it more than any other book I've ever read (and that includes my cherished Bible).
From the author.......2001-09-25
Hi Folks,
I just wanted to say thank you to all the readers who've read Mad House and either posted here or contacted me. So many of you are also siblings, and I am gratified that many of you have found your experiences reflected in my book. I've tried to show, through my experiences and the dozens of you interviewed, that while our story may be one of the quieter ones in our family, it is still valid and deserving of space. Strength and health to you all!
I've used the same combination of memoir and interviews (more than 70) in my new book, "Fatherless Women: How We Change After We Lose Our Dads" (Wiley). If any of you read that, please let me know what you think.
peace,
Clea
Maelstrom of Mental Illness .......2000-08-28
Clea is the luckiest of her siblings. Her older brother Daniel, a brilliant boy, showed signs of psychosis in early adulthood. He somehow managed to attend Harvard and upon leaving the renowned university, succumbs to his illness. He marries a woman from his halfway house and they have a daughter. The brother commits suicide and the baby remains unheard from. Clea was in college at the time of her brother's death and her parents curiously give her a false account of how her brother killed himself. That is never explained.
Clea's sister Katherine/Althea appears to be the most unstable. She, too, started showing signs of the illness in late adolescence and was barely able to fight her psychosis and finish high school. She lived from hospital to halfway house, never really finding her niche. Her erratic behavior precluded her from staying at halfway houses and in one memorable account in the book, a landlady requested that her parents come and collect her after she defecated on a mattress. She remained a "living" casualty of mental illness; at the close of the book, Clea did not even know where she was.
Clea is a strong voice, a strong advocate for the families of the mentally ill. Her poignant book is yet another reminder that mental illness is often a family illness because of the tragic impact it has on non-mentally ill members.
Average customer rating:
- Blais' first book - dark, cynical, and beautiful
- I like to read books.
- Better in french
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Mad Shadows (New Canadian Library)
Marie-Claire Blais
Manufacturer: New Canadian Library
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The Bride Price
ASIN: 0771098677
Release Date: 1990-07-01 |
Book Description
A harrowing pathology of the soul, Mad Shadows centres on a family group: Patrice, the beautiful and narcissistic son; his ugly and malicious sister, Isabelle-Marie; and Louise, their vain and uncomprehending mother. These characters inhabit an amoral universe where beauty reflects no truth and love is an empty delusion. Each character is ultimately annihilated by their own obsessions.
Acclaimed and reviled when it exploded on the Quebec literary scene in 1959, Mad Shadows initiated a new era in Quebec fiction.
Customer Reviews:
Blais' first book - dark, cynical, and beautiful.......2005-06-07
This is a very short novel, but very good. I can only read the english version, from the translation all i can say is she has a simple style, never too verbose, yet each word is perfectly and simply chosen to precisedly add mood to each scene. A great intro to her writing.
I like to read books........2000-05-31
I thought this book was quite interestig. I would like you to e-mail me at bloodgusher666@hotmail.com if you like to read too.
Better in french.......1998-02-23
This book is beautifully written. The symbolism in this book is deeper than i have ever read before. It is a very sombre novel with so much to get out. If you can read french then definitely pick this up in french because you will find all of the symbolism in this book to be at a much deeper level. this book was meant for french and unfortunately it does tend to lose some of its meaning and qaulity but it is still just as great of a story. i definitely reccomend this book. it is a great achievment of a great author. The novel seems even more interesting and intriguing when you know that she wrote it in only 13 days. it's a must!!! KH, 16
Product Description
3 PBs, 2 Med Sz PBs, 2 HB
Average customer rating:
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Mad Shadows
Marie-Claire Blais
Manufacturer: McClelland & Stewart
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000JRDXJY |
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Pet Shop of Horrors, Book 3
Matsuri Akino
Manufacturer: TokyoPop
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ASIN: 159182365X |
Customer Reviews:
fantastic fun.......2004-01-08
I have a hard time deciding which, out of the 4 volumes Tokyopop has released of this manga, is my favorite. I still can't pick! Volume 3 is certainly not short on charm, plot, or beautiful artwork. Count D, everybody's favorite Chinese transvestite petshop owner, gets to display more sides of his character than ever before: cute, kindhearted, and definitely sinister. "Dessert" is an especially delightful chapter for shounen-ai (read: ... lite) fans. I really recommend this whole manga series. It's delightful.
Dessert.......2003-11-19
The books seem to be just getting better and better as the series goes on. In this book we find out more about the mysterious character Count D. We are given a hint as to the usefulness of his different color eyes and we also discover just how far the Count will go to get his hands on a rare and valuable pet....
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- Other Books
- No Hollywood ending here
- A dark classic
- Supterstud
- Literary Classic
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The Natural
Bernard Malamud , and
Kevin Baker
Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
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ASIN: 0374502005 |
Amazon.com
Roy Hobbs, the protagonist of The Natural, makes the mistake of pronouncing aloud his dream: to be the best there ever was. Such hubris, of course, invites divine intervention, but the brilliance of Bernard Malamud's novel is the second chance it offers its hero, elevating him--and his story--into the realm of myth.
Book Description
The classical novel (and basis for the acclaimed film) now in a new edition
Introduction by Kevin Baker
The Natural, Bernard Malamud’s first novel, published in 1952, is also the first—and some would say still the best—novel ever written about baseball. In it Malamud, usually appreciated for his unerring portrayals of postwar Jewish life, took on very different material—the story of a superbly gifted “natural” at play in the fields of the old daylight baseball era—and invested it with the hardscrabble poetry, at once grand and altogether believable, that runs through all his best work. Four decades later, Alfred Kazin’s comment still holds true: “Malamud has done something which—now that he has done it!—looks as if we have been waiting for it all our lives. He has really raised the whole passion and craziness and fanaticism of baseball as a popular spectacle to its ordained place in mythology.”
Customer Reviews:
Other Books.......2007-09-03
A supremely outstanding baseball player is not supremely outstanding off the field, and ends up having a lot of problems because of his stardom and inability to cope with that in general.
This book is ok, but as far as sport books go you can certainly get better and more interesting things to read than this.
No Hollywood ending here.......2007-08-26
On the surface, Bernard Malamud's "The Natural" is a book about baseball and the exploits of mythic ballplayer Roy Hobbs. Delving deeper Malamud chronicles the relentless peaks and valleys of human existence as Hobbs goes through cycles of decimation and resurrection. "The Natural", Malamud's first published novel has been compared to Homer's "The Odyssey" as we follow Hobb's meandering trek through life.
We are introduced to Hobbs as a 19 year old pitching phenom aboard a train headed for a tryout with the Chicago Cubs, shepherded by an ex-major league catcher Sam. In a cruel reversal of fortune Hobbs hooks up with a crazed gal he met on the train in Chicago and gets gut shot for his trouble.
Fast forwarding ahead we next see a mid thirtyish Hobbs reporting to the dreadful New York Knights major league baseball team after having been signed to a contract. Hobbs originally scorned and benched by manager Pop Fisher eventually turns into a baseball icon hitting and fielding his way into legendary status. His exploits have the doleful Knights skyrocketing in the standings threatening to finally win a pennant. Hobbs however goes through his slumps as the cycles of his life continue to wax and wane even after momentarily attaining his dream of being the best in the game.
Hobbs a hero who totes around some heavy excess baggage cannot divorce himself from his attraction to loose women and pursues Pop Fisher's niece, a floozy named Memo who comports with gamblers. Despite meeting a fine woman, Iris, who stood by him during the depths of his most desperate slump, he cannot smell the coffee and give up Memo.
The story continues with the fortunes of Hobbs bouncing up and down like the stock market, concluding in a much more realistic ending in a style Malamud used in other books, than seen in the movie version. Malamud used real life events in the history of baseball lore to craft the plot and characters in this novel.
A dark classic.......2007-07-29
Those who have seen the movie but have not read the book will be surprised. Bernard Malamud paints a much darker picture of the odyssey of Roy Hobbs. The book takes the arc of one person's career--Roy Hobbs--and weds it to a couple grim episodes in baseball's history: Eddie Waitkus and the Black Sox.
The Hobbs of the novel is wonderfully talented--but very human. In the movie, there is a prolonged slump after Hobbs links up with Paris Memo. In the novel, he sometimes simply has a slump. In the novel, he appears to have supernatural powers; in the novel, he is very talented but very human.
The movie's uplifting ending works. The novel's darker ending also works. Each version of "The Natural" works well in its own right; the momentum in each moves toward the closing.
Malamud writes well and creates characters that seem to have life to them. He also captures the very human--and vulnerable--traits of the characters.
Even if you liked the movie and its view of Roy Hobbs, you will find the book gripping in its own, very different way.
Supterstud.......2007-07-29
This is a great book, but it is not the same story as the movie. In fact, it is much darker and more pessimistic. If you loved the movie, and now want to read the book, please remember that the story is quite different. This was author Bernard Malamud's first great literary success. It is classic and timeless. If you buy it expecting FIELD OF DREAMS or MAJOR LEAGUE you will be very disappointed in how it ends. This is not a romance or a feel good type of book. It should be read as a myth not as a baseball adventure. The ending will surprise the hell out of you after watching the watered down Robert Redford movie.
Literary Classic.......2007-05-12
This is truly a classic. Malamud develops deep themes in a seemingly simple world of baseball worship. A must read for anyone wanting to delve into America's favorite pastime with a an intellectual lens.
Amazon.com
Due to his formidable skill as a novelist--and to the fact that one of his novels, The Natural, had the good or bad luck to be repackaged as a large-screen vehicle for Robert Redford--Bernard Malamud hasn't always been recognized as short-story master of the first rank. As this collection demonstrates once and for all, he is. The anthology pieces, such as "The Magic Barrel," "The Silver Dish," or "Rembrandt's Hat," would be more than enough to place the author in the pantheon. But the 54 stories gathered here represent an astonishing abundance of narrative smarts and brilliant, Yiddish-accented prose. Malamud's heroes meet all manner of misfortune--there's something distinctly Job-like about even his most contented characters (a typical one has "a sort of indigenous sadness [that] hung on or around him")--yet the author suffuses their woes with gentle comedy. And while Jews occupy center stage in almost every tale, they are universal rather than parochial figures: as the beleaguered tailor in "Angel Levine" triumphantly informs his wife, "Believe me, there are Jews everywhere."
Book Description
New York Times Notable Book of the Year
Publishers Weekly Best Book of 1997
With an Introduction by Robert Giroux, The Complete Stories of Bernard Malamud is "an essential American book," Richard Stern declared in the Chicago Tribune when the collection was published in hardcover. His praise was echoed by other reviewers and by readers, who embraced the book as they might a displaced person in one of Malamud's stories, now returned to us, complete and fulfilled and recognized at last. The volume gathers together fifty-five stories, from "Armistice" (1940) to "Alma Redeemed" (1984), and including the immortal stories from The Magic Barrel and the vivid depictions of the unforgettable Fidelman. It is a varied and generous collection of great examples of the modern short story, which Malamud perfected, and an ideal introduction to the work of this great American writer.
Customer Reviews:
"The Last Mohican".......2006-11-26
This collection reveals the genius of Malamud as a short story writer second to none. The Georgia Catholic author Flannery O'Connor saw this clearly when, after reading Malamud, she remarked wittily on why Jewish writers were "different." In her words, "They're smarter than us." To my mind, the signal story in this collection is the too little known "The Last Mohican." This comical Arthur Fidelman story, about a failed Jewish artist who's come to Italy to write a critical study on the Christian artist Giotto, is itself a profound Judeo-Christian adventure - with Tolstoy's views on art thrown in - involving a hilarious but moving "conversion" in its central figure. The story's clear implication is the paradoxical idea that gain often involves a loss of sorts. One can see here when reading, say, her story "Good Country People," what the great Flannery O'Connor learned as a writer from her equally great predecessor in the short story, Bernard Malamud.
Master of the Short Story.......2006-10-16
Called the modern master of the short story, Malamud has won two National Book Awards and the Pulitzer Prize (for the Fixer). The Complete Stories is a collection of short stories -- bound by a central theme. All are about individuals faced with moral decisions or confronted by societal limitations. You'll find that the stories in this book highlight the mundane and the absurd.
I was touched by the characters in the book because they are so human. I was amused, angered, and felt great pity for these fictional people. I rarely read fiction, so few authors seem to me able to "get it right". Malamud has it right. The characters react like normal people. They are alive with conflict. Like the rest of us, they sometimes make poor choices and may live unfulfilled lives.
One of my favorite stories is Riding Pants. In "Riding Pants" we meet Herm, who is the sixteen year old son of a butcher. Herm lives alienated by the world around him. Riding is the only joy in his life. Like a small child's security blanket, his riding pants bring him solace. Frustrated by his son's refusal to accept his world, his father takes a drastic step.
If you want fairy tale endings and beautiful people riding into the sunset, this may not be the best book for you. If you want to taste life from the eyes of another, perhaps discovery a truth about yourself. Read The Complete Stories. This is an excellent book!!!
Beautiful short story anthology.......2006-04-17
I heard about the writer during the Nextbook.org book readings in Chicago. I have never read any of Malamud's work previously. Curious to learn about how he perceived life of immigrants, Jewish underclass and life struggles in general, I have decided to read his complete collection of short stories. It was pure delight to read these short stories not only because of their intense content, bu also because it gave complete insight of the Malamud's growth as a writer. One can see how his writing and style is changing and evolving over time. It becomes better and better with writer's personal maturity. I would stongly recommend this writer to anyone who wants to read about Jewish culture, learn about life of immigrants in the period between 1930s-1960s. Now I am looking forward to read Malamud's other work.
Even better than his novels.......2005-07-08
I picked this book up because I liked the cover and I thought, however right or wrong, that a publisher would release a collection of this length to only a quality writer. I was not wrong; this man is a master. I have read "The First Seven Years" at least fifteen times, and I have my classes read it all the time. I wish I could have met Malamud.
A very good story writer .......2004-12-27
Malamud has written some of the most noted stories of the second half of the American twentieth century. His famous 'The Magic Barrel'with its broken characters broken Yiddish sufferings disappointments and strange poetic intensity is perhaps the most well- known and emblematic of his general approach as a writer. Malamud is a man of the precise word, the carefully drawn artistic touch, the minor note of beauty which suddenly pains. Malamud is the person of sympathy with the sufferings of his own characters, and with the ideology that this suffering is what makes them most human . In another sense the suffering is what defines the Jews and is where Judaism too becomes emblematic of what humanity is. Malamud travels in different worlds for his stories in the Italy of Fidelman , and in the far off Western regions of America where Jews are very rare and distant strangers. Of the many different kinds of encounters in his story he makes his own poetic universe, touched with small irony, and with a Yiddish bittersweetness.
These are stories for those who love the high art of small tones and intuitions of one of the finest story- writers of his time.
Book Description
Winner of the National Book Award for Fiction
Introduction by Jhumpa Lahiri
Bernard Malamud's first book of short stories, The Magic Barrel, has been recognized as a classic from the time it was published in 1959. The stories are set in New York and in Italy (where Malamud's alter ego, the struggleing New York Jewish Painter Arthur Fidelman, roams amid the ruins of old Europe in search of his artistic patrimony); they tell of egg candlers and shoemakers, matchmakers, and rabbis, in a voice that blends vigorous urban realism, Yiddish idiom, and a dash of artistic magic.
The Magic Barrel is a book about New York and about the immigrant experience, and it is high point in the modern American short story. Few books of any kind have managed to depict struggle and frustration and heartbreak with such delight, or such artistry.
Customer Reviews:
Book Exactly as Described-Fast Delivery.......2006-12-02
I was looking for a hard to find book in large print. I was shocked to see that they were selling a new edition for about $1.57. I was skeptical but for the price took a chance and was amazed to find that I received exactly what was described in perfect brand new condition. The delivery time was also very, very fast. I'll check out their WEB site in the future for more extraordinary values.
Craig Heard, New York, NY
Magic Malamud .......2006-12-01
Malamud does three or four tricks in his fiction well, and here he does each one to utter perfection. And when taken together, this collection of stories almost transcends Malamud's normal limits: the stories are compressed, short, and below the surface, charged with almost unbearable tension. Unlike other collections of stories (or when you read too many Malamud stories) Malamud does not parody himself in the Magic Barrell. Everything is where it is supposed to be, and works like a well oiled machine. It is a shame that (as of writing this) only eight people have reviewed this masterpiece of a short story collection. In Roth's The Ghost Writer, Zuckerman explains that the world's morality has already passed by the E.I. Lonoff's (a character based on Malamud). Seems Roth was correct... and this is true even more today, thirty years after the publication of The Ghost Writer. We no longer live in Malamud's world, and it is a shame.
50 years later, still relevant.......2006-03-18
These stories about New York, even when read fifty years later by someone like me from a totally different demographic, in Los Angeles, are still relevant. There are universal self-loathing themes for all immigrants, at all times. I wouldn't call it immigrant lit, but it's more like human diaspora lit, the transience of people, and how people make sense, however limited, of the world around them. Strongly recommend. Malamud is able to make writing about trash untrashy, but not in a falsely glorifying way, but in a humanizing way. These are real short stories, not failed novellas.
Small sad suffering and quiet beauty .......2004-10-12
These stories are pervaded with a certain sadness and disappointment, a sense of life as largely a trial in suffering. They are also however deep in a kind of quiet beauty, a unique language of slightly Yiddishized American colloquial restraint. The title story, and the most famous one tells of the hopes and disappointments of poor Jews seeking to find their ' bashert' their destined mate. It touches upon the world of tormented souls selling illusions to themselves and others. It really moves us with the sense of how the dreams of life turn bitterness into greater bitterness, with longing disappointment beauty. These stories are for those who are willing to read and take inspiration from the sadnesses of life, that nonetheless enrich our human meaning.
BORING!.......2004-10-06
I would suggest before sitting down to read this book that you brew a large pot of coffee. Or better yet, don't sit down to read it at all. This is dry stuff!
Average customer rating:
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The Stories of Bernard Malamud
Bernard Malamud
Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0374270376 |
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Bernard Malamud Selected Stories
Bernard Malamud
Manufacturer: Penguin Putnam~trade
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ASIN: 0140071261 |
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Bernard Malamud: A Study of the Short Fiction (Twayne's Studies in Short Fiction)
Robert Solotaroff
Manufacturer: Twayne Publishers
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0805783164 |
Average customer rating:
- Deep, complex, and beautiful
|
Idiots First
Bernard Malamud
Manufacturer: Farrar Straus & Giroux
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Contemporary
| General
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
Malamud, Bernard
| ( M )
| Authors, A-Z
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0374520100 |
Customer Reviews:
Deep, complex, and beautiful.......2003-06-24
I happened to be assigned this book for a college lit class, and knew nothing of Malamud at the time. After reading the story for which the book is named, Idiots First, I could not stop reading. His stories are so deeply insightful into the complexities of the human soul, and the painful and paradoxical nature of everyday life. Aside from the philosophical aspects, he writes with the voice of a true New Yorker, and reflects the universal experience of growing up as an immigrant in a big city. Read it! You'll love it!
Customer Reviews:
Wonderful Cookbook!.......2007-05-25
I highly recommend this Chinese cookbook. I don't know if I just lucked out when selecting it, but I will tell you it was put together very well by Rhonda Lauret Parkinson. It is packed full of recipes we have all heard of and feasted on at the tastiest restaurants. For example, I became really excited to learn how to make Honey Walnut Prawns, a dish that my husband and I really enjoyed at our favorite chinese restaurant in an area we long since relocated from. We hadn't been able to find a restaurant that served them since then--not until very recently. And I have to say, hands down, the recipe in the book is far better than the dish we had in Seattle. Also, I love all the tips she gives because I find them extremely helpful.
Has All the Good Recipes.......2005-01-05
The thing about this book that distinguishes it from other Chinese cookbooks, is that is had ALL the recipes I was looking for (e.g., black bean sauce for noodles, Dan Dan, Singapore noodles, sweet and sour shrimp, etc). The only downside is that the author decided to make some of the dishes lighter (e.g., not having the shrimps dipped in batter and fried for the sweet & sour shrimp) - which I think should go into a different kind of book than a general Chinese recipe book as this. However, to me that is something that can easily be corrected without exercising too much imagination.
I've flipped through many Chinese cookbooks, and this is the only one that I've bought.
Simple but easy cooking.......2004-08-02
This book is pretty good for beginners like me ..it's so informative on the cultures and what to do but ..there's no illustration of the food itself how it would look like when it's done...so basically having to guess what it looks like ,however it definately teaches me how to make the food from dim sum but and it's pretty simple and easy but the ingredients are sort of hard to get ...in all like i said it's a good book .
Deliver expertly prepared and palate pleasing Chinese fare.......2003-11-14
In The Everything Chinese Cookbook, Chinese cuisine expert Rhonda Lauret Parkinson has developed a truly "user friendly" specialty cookbook which is ideal for the novice kitchen cook wanting to prepare and serve traditional Chinese dishes as part of a family dining experience. With an informed and informative introductory chapter on getting started with respect to Chinese cooking, individual chapters are devoted to dipping sauces, appetizers, soups and salads, rice and noodles, beef dishes, pork entrees, chicken and other poultry, tofu and eggs, fish and other seafood, Chinese vegetables; desserts and snacks. An ideal introduction into the kitchen mechanics of preparing popular Chinese dishes, The Everything Chinese Cookbook is further enhanced with two appendices: "Putting It All Together" and "Glossary of Asian Ingredient". The Everything Chinese Cookbook will take even the most amateur kitchen cook and show how to deliver expertly prepared and palate pleasing Chinese fare for ordinary daily dining or those special celebratory dinners with a true Chinese flair and expertise.
For the Chinese Takeout lover!.......2003-09-07
I love Chinese food: Not the torturous, pages-long recipes found in "gourmet" chinese cookbooks, but the delicious concoctions I can get at the local Oriental restaurant. This terrific book seems to have been cribbed from a Chinese takeout menu; all your favorite are here, from Moo Goo Gai Pan to Hot-and-Sour Soup. the recipes are well written and easy-to-follow, and none of the dishes is difficult to prepare. There are hints and tips for the novice, as well. A great value!
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