Blood, Bones, and Butter

It’s memoir time again! Memoirs and autobiographies are such interesting books because they fall into such a unique category when trying to decide if you like them or not. How can you say that someone’s life story was ‘bad’? I think some memoir review ground rules are in order.

First - Is the writing itself good? Does it meet or rise above the standard in order to be considered good writing on its own? Pretty obvious.

Second - Is this a story worth telling? I could tell my life story right now and about 80% of readers would be left wondering why I had written it. My vacation to Vermont can be saved for an Instagram. To write a whole book about your life requires either a big ego, or to be extremely self aware that the author has lived an extraordinary life. For example: A River in Darkness is a memoir about a man who escaped from North Korea after living there for 30+ years. Writing about that experience makes sense.

Third - Is the story engaging? Some people might not have the most extraordinary life, but can use language to make their slice of it seem like the most extraordinary thing. Sometimes a strong personality can make a memoir with a less exciting story engaging.

So, how does Gabrielle Hamilton’s memoir hold up to these extremely rigorous and definitely well thought out standards? Pretty well I’d say.

The writing is very crisp, with special attention to details and emotions. This is no surprise since Hamilton has a Master’s in Fiction Writing, so she knows her way around the english language. She describes how she’s feeling in a way I only wish I could. When her husband asks about buying a new iPhone, the reader is really extremely aware that this is not what she wants to hear at that point in time. Her love for her mother-in-law is also eloquently and lovingly described. I have no problems with the writing; the story is where the issues arise.

The book itself is divided into three parts - Blood, Bones, and Butter - and they can basically be described as childhood to teens, teens to late twenties, and late twenties to roughly forty. More-so though, they describe the beginning of her adulthood, the beginning of her writing and cooking career, and the beginning of her family. This book has all of the trappings of a chef memoir: it’s title involves ingredients or things you can eat, the cover is a chicken head, even the subheading says that it’s the EDUCATION of a CHEF. But I don’t really think it’s a Kitchen Confidential, “How I got my start in the Industry”, type of book. It’s more a “personal journey” memoir, with cooking as the seasoning (ha).

The problem is there is no overarching story, really. The first part is just some vignettes about her parents, her siblings, and what life was like then. The second part deals with Hamilton getting her Master’s in writing, trying to figure out where she fits in, and opening her restaurant, and the third deals with her marriage, and, more importantly, her relationship with her mother-in-law. It really seems like three essays pushed together in one book. which doesn’t really lend itself to having that overarching story that, say Educated by Tara Westover does.

Luckily, the way Hamilton writes reminds me of a cool aunt or older cousin you look up to, which makes reading the vignettes so enjoyable. She definitely hits that third category of having a strong personality hard, and I think it makes up for the lack of overarching narrative. Reading about her years working as a summer-camp chef was worth it to me, even if it only played a small role in the story. Reading the book was like listening to someone really engaging telling maybe not their best story, but one you still like listening to because you like how they tell it so much. I definitely understand that some people will think this could’ve been 50 pages shorter, or more focused, or different in some way, but I didn’t need it to be any of that.

To me, this was not quite a spiritual successor, but a spiritual cousin to Kitchen Confidential, and that’s enough.

4/5 - Kinda like late-era Shaq, not exactly the best, but doing exactly what he wants to do.

Also, I’m changing the rating system to just any NBA player I feel is comparable. Deal with it.