The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine by Alina Bronsky

Rosa, the narrator and protagonist of the novel, controls, manipulates and judges everyone around her to get what she wants. Several months later, Sulfia gives birth to a baby girl named Aminat.Īlina Bronsky’s novel, The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine, is the story of a lifetime of manipulations by a mostly, but not always, well-wishing mother.

Scalding mustard seed baths, concoctions made of cranberry and stewed laurel leaves and a knitting needle inserted into the abdomen make Sulfia violently ill but fail to take care of her problem.

After overcoming this disgust for her own child, Rosa feels sorry for the girl and takes action. And yet somehow she was my daughter-worse still, my only daughter.”Īs her seventeen-year-old daughter sobs on a kitchen stool after confessing she is pregnant with an unknown man’s child, all Rosa can think about is how stupid, pathetic and unfortunate looking her only offspring is at that moment. In fact, to be honest, I’d say she was rather stupid. Europa’s month long celebration is technically over, but you can read about the festivities here. We ran a review a very positive review of Bronsky’s Broken Glass Park back in the day, and I’m really glad we’re finally able to post something on her new book.Īlso worth noting that The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine is the 100th book published by Europa Editions-a pretty amazing accomplishment, especially since it seems like just yesterday that they were launching their operation. Buy online here.The latest addition to our Reviews Section is a piece by Adelaide Kuehn on Alina Bronsky’s The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine, which is translated from the German by Tim Mohr and available from Europa Editions.Īdelaide is a former intern and translation student, who has written for Three Percent a couple times in the past. The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine is available at WORD for $15. It often seems like everybody who comes in the store is looking for a funny book for a change of pace I can’t wait to sell them this one.' Bronsky’s use of language is vibrant and surprising and I was heartbroken when the book was over. I don't think I've enjoyed hating a narrator so much since I read Money by Martin Amis. The main character is thoroughly detestable in her manipulations of everyone around her, but despite that (or, more likely, because of it!), I miss her very much now that she’s gone. Stephanie says: 'What an incredible book.

The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine by Alina Bronsky Here's what store manager Stephanie Anderson has been dog-earing recently: To kick things off, we talked to Greenpoint indie bookstore WORD, whom we typically trust in all things reading-related. Welcome to our new weekly column, 'Staff Picks,' in which we ask the staffers at our favorite book, music, and movie stores around to town to share with us what they're reading, listening to, and watching this week.