Stacy Alesi's BookBitch.com™

The news from Ukraine is just heartbreaking. My grandmother was from Kyiv, although I grew up being told she was from Russia. Turns out she was born in the “Russian Empire” in the city of Kyiv in the Ukraine. Her parents were killed and she was sent to America as an infant to live with an aunt and uncle in upstate New York. That was around the turn of the last century. And here we are again, the Jewish president with a target on his back and the country invaded by another madman.

Here’s how Americans can donate to help people in Ukraine* via the Washington Post. I donated to World Central Kitchen, Chef Jose Andres’s foundation. He is already there, feeding the refugees and anyone else who is hungry. https://wck.org/relief/activation-chefs-for-ukraine

With all the wars the US has been involved with in my lifetime, somehow what is happening in Ukraine feels different, even though American lives are not on the front lines. In 1990, I purchased a book called The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien. The review is buried deep on my blog, so I’m adding it here. It is one of the seminal works of the Vietnam War. Interestingly, O’Brien won the National Book Award for Going After Cacciato (another excellent book) but not this one which has become a classic. Why am I bringing this up? Yesterday, I saw that title in the New York Times in reference to this article about Ukrainians fleeing their country: The One Item They Had to Take When These 6 Afghans Fled*

THE THINGS THEY CARRIED by Tim O’Brien: I bought this book in 1990, read the first few chapters/stories and then came to “On the Rainy River.” It upset me so much that I put the book down and didn’t pick it back up again for sixteen years.

I don’t think most people would pick that particular story as the most upsetting, or the hardest to read, because it’s not about the horrors of Vietnam. Instead, it’s about the horrors of a young man getting his draft notice, and as that was a much more personal recollection for me, it packed an enormous emotional wallop. For me.

“I was a coward. I went to the war.”

I’m sure others had a much harder time with “The Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong”, about a soldier who smuggles his girlfriend in from the states and what happens to her during her stay there, or with “The Man I Killed” with a grenade or with “The Ghost Soldiers.”

This book is a novel, a memoir, a collection of stories, a series of vignettes, the seminal work of fiction on the Vietnam War – take your pick, it’s all of these and more. The title page emphatically states that it is fiction, and indeed, there is even a chapter/story entitled “How to Tell a True War Story”, yet it is also dedicated to men with the same names as the characters in the book, and there is even a character named “Tim O’Brien”. But as O’Brien points out, the truth is a slippery thing, and if calling it fiction works best for the author, especially in light of the recent brouhaha over creative nonfiction writing, I certainly won’t argue the point.

Several of the chapters were previously published as short stories, including the title piece, “The Things they Carried”, an amazing piece of writing either on its own or as the opening to a novel. O’Brien lists the physical items that men carried with them in Vietnam, from the mundane like canteens and a toothbrush, to the war necessities of “…the three standard weapons – the M-60, M-16, and M-79 – they carried whatever presented itself, or whatever seemed appropriate as a means of killing or staying alive.” They carried good luck charms, a rabbit’s foot, a pebble sent from a girl back home. They carried diseases, and “…all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing.”

The stories are often tellings and retellings of the same event from different perspectives, again proving how difficult it is to nail down the truth. They flow, never moving linearly but rather back and forth through time, before the war, during the war, and homecoming. All in all, a very emotional read for me and I’m very glad I finally finished it. The first half or so of the title story is available on Google Books if you want to take a look.

“But this too is true: stories can save us.”

04/06; updated 03/22 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

It is starting to feel like life is getting back to somewhat normal, or a new normal, at least. As of Feb. 25, the CDC has updated its Covid-19 guidelines. If you are lucky enough to live in an area where the COVID-19 Community Level is low, all restrictions have pretty much been lifted. You can check your Community Level by entering your state and county on the online form here: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/your-health/covid-by-county.html. As of yesterday, where I live the level is “Medium” which means masks are not really needed unless you are high risk. That said, I’m not quite ready to stop wearing a mask in busy public indoor spaces, but I am definitely in the minority.

I think most people are just sick of it all – sick of wearing a mask, of isolating, of this whole damn pandemic. And I get that. But I still have some fears, especially concerning my husband and his health issues, and my too-young-to-be-vaccinated grandson, so wearing a mask makes me feel a tiny bit safer so that’s what I’m doing. For now. If my community level drops to “low,” I will probably retire my masks. As far as flying goes, that is up in the air (sorry!) The federal mask mandate is set to end soon, but whether it will be extended is unknown at this time.

What’s Cooking

I may be late to the party but I decided to try the viral recipe for Pasta Chips from TikTok, where all viral recipes come from now.

I know that when I make baked pasta, like baked ziti or lasagna, my favorite bites are of the crispy pasta on the top, so this sounded interesting to me. I made some soup the other night and had some leftover “pasta ribbons” so I decided to give it a try. I accidentally bought these instead of egg noodles – they look like egg noodles but they don’t have eggs in them, so Publix calls them “pasta ribbons.” I tossed them with a bit of olive oil. I decided to go with a “cacio e pepe” flavoring, so I grated some Romano cheese, coarsely ground some black pepper, and tossed it all together. I threw it in a single layer in the air fryer, and voila! Pasta chips.

It took about 10 minutes or so in the air fryer, and since I already had the cooked pasta, only another minute to grate everything and mix it up, so it was pretty easy to make. Most people serve these with some kind of dipping sauce like marinara sauce, and a feta dip is pretty popular, too. I didn’t bother since I only had a cup or so of the noodles, so we just ate them as is. They were tasty – not the best thing I’ve ever made by any means, and nothing I would set out to make. I mean, I wouldn’t cook up a pound of pasta to make this. But if I end up with some leftover pasta again, I would make it again. As far as snack foods go, it’s probably on the healthier side of things if you don’t mind the carbs. And by that I mean healthier than Doritos or potato chips!

The Washington Post wasn’t thrilled; this was their headline: TikTok’s viral pasta chips are a mediocre mess that I’ll never make again*. That said, they did their excellent reporting anyway and dug deep into the history of this dish. That led me to Toasted Ravioli*, which I’ve been meaning to make. I even bought a small bag of frozen smoked mozzarella ravioli from Aldi to try it with, but haven’t gone there yet. But now that Voraciously, the food arm of the Washington Post, led me to their recipe, I will give it a try soon.

Chile Peppers

I stumbled across this article in the Washington Post from a few years ago: A guide to dried chile peppers — your secret flavor weapon in the kitchen. I took a cooking class several years ago and they gave us some dried arbol chilies. I didn’t know what to do with them besides the recipe we made and I wasn’t sure how long they would keep, so I ended up throwing them away. Foolish me. Recently, I was at Aldi’s, the first time since the pandemic began (!) and they had a few different kinds of dried chilies from the Badia spice company. I purchased the ancho and guajillo, and have almost used them up already. It’s been cold here in the Sunshine State and I’ve been making chili.

Unfortunately, my experience with Aldi is to not bother making a list, I just wander through and see what they have. Most of the time I never see the same things there again. Even basics can be frustrating to find. I’ve looked for celery or cucumbers or Greek yogurt and they haven’t had them at one time or another. And this was pre-pandemic/supply chain issues! But I do enjoy the serendipity of shopping there occasionally, like finding smoked mozzarella ravioli and dried chilies.

Book News

How a Book Is Made*: Ink, paper, and a 200,000 pound printer! Have you ever wondered how a book becomes a book? Join the New York Times as they follow Marlon James’s “Moon Witch, Spider King” through the printing process.

Lisa Gardner, the Thriller Writer Who Loves Historical Romance*: I’ve known Lisa for years, and now you can, too!

2022 ITW Thriller Awards Nominees have been announced!

BEST HARDCOVER NOVEL

Megan Abbott – THE TURNOUT (Penguin/Putnam)
S. A. Cosby – RAZORBLADE TEARS (Flatiron Books)
Alice Feeney – ROCK PAPER SCISSORS (Flatiron Books)
Rachel Howzell Hall – THESE TOXIC THINGS (Thomas & Mercer)
Alma Katsu – RED WIDOW (Penguin/Putnam)
Eric Rickstad – I AM NOT WHO YOU THINK I AM (Blackstone Publishing)

BEST AUDIOBOOK

S. A. Cosby – RAZORBLADE TEARS (Macmillan)
Narrated by Adam Lazarre-White
Samantha Downing – SLEEPING DOG LIE (Audible Originals)
Narrated by Melanie Nicholls-King and Lindsey Dorcus
Rachel Howzell Hall – HOW IT ENDS (Audible Originals)
Narrated by Joniece Abbott-Pratt
Gregg Hurwitz – PRODIGAL SON (Macmillan)
Narrated by Scott Brick
Nadine Matheson – THE JIGSAW MAN (HarperCollins)
Narrated by Davine Henry

BEST FIRST NOVEL

Abigail Dean – GIRL A (HarperCollins)
Eloísa Díaz – REPENTANCE (Agora Books)
Amanda Jayatissa – MY SWEET GIRL (Berkley)
David McCloskey – DAMASCUS STATION (W.W. Norton & Company)
Eric Redman – BONES OF HILO (Crooked Lane Books)

BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL NOVEL

Joy Castro – FLIGHT RISK (Lake Union)
Aaron Philip Clark – UNDER COLOR OF LAW (Thomas & Mercer)
C. J. Cooke – THE LIGHTHOUSE WITCHES (Berkley)
Jess Lourey – BLOODLINE (Thomas & Mercer)
Terry Roberts – MY MISTRESS’ EYES ARE RAVEN BLACK (Turner Publishing Company)

BEST SHORT STORY

S.A. Cosby – “Not My Cross to Bear” (Down & Out Books)
William Burton McCormick – “Demon in the Depths” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
Scott Loring Sanders – “The Lemonade Stand” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
Jeff Soloway – “The Interpreter and the Killer” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)
John Wimer – “Bad Chemistry” (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine)

BEST YOUNG ADULT NOVEL

Maureen Johnson – THE BOX IN THE WOODS (HarperCollins)
Nova McBee – CALCULATED (Wolfpack Publishing LLC)
Ginny Myers Sain – DARK AND SHALLOW LIES (Penguin Young Readers)
Courtney Summers – THE PROJECT (Wednesday Books)
Krystal Sutherland – HOUSE OF HOLLOW (Penguin Young Readers)

BEST E-BOOK ORIGINAL NOVEL

Greig Beck – THE DARK SIDE: ALEX HUNTER 9 (Pan Macmillan)
John Connell – WHERE THE WICKED TREAD (John Connell)
Wendy Dranfield – LITTLE GIRL TAKEN (Bookouture)
E.J. Findorff – BLOOD PARISH (E.J. Findorff)
S. E. Green – MOTHER MAY I (S. E. Green)
Andrew Kaplan – BLUE MADAGASCAR (Andrew Kaplan)
Karin Nordin – LAST ONE ALIVE (HarperCollins)

ITW will announce the winners at ThrillerFest XVII on Saturday, June 4, 2022 at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel, New York City. Congratulations to all the finalists!

As always, thanks for reading and stay safe.

Welcome back to the pandemic that never ends! Ever hopeful, last June I changed the name of this monthly journal from “Coronavirus Diary” to “Cerebration,” meaning to use the mind, to think. Plus it sounds like “celebration” which I thought we could do because, no more Covid. It seemed like the worst of it was over. There were vaccines available everywhere. I was so naïve. Here we are almost two years in and the experts still can’t agree on anything except the novel coronavirus is here to stay, in all its variant glory. I give up; my Coronavirus Diary is also here to stay.

A couple of weeks ago, I was reading the “On Parenting” newsletter written by Jessica Grose for the New York Times. I have a grandson now and things have changed a lot since my kids were infants, and I like to keep up on what’s new, so I subscribed. Anyway, Grose mentioned how her 9-year-old daughter was wondering if the pandemic would still be around when she was ready for college, and she goes on to say she wasn’t “quite ready to break down the difference between ‘pandemic’ and ‘endemic.’” That was in the newsletter I received, but she also wrote an op-ed, Your Kid’s Existential Dread Is Normal. that touches on parenting during this pandemic that parents may find helpful.

We keep thinking this will end at some point, this life with masks and vaccines and incredibly selfish people who use neither. But what if we are wrong. What if, without our even realizing it, this pandemic has evolved into an endemic. And why do we never hear “epidemic,” which seems most like what we are experiencing? I looked to the internet and Merriam Webster for answers.

epidemic: an outbreak of disease that spreads quickly and affects many individuals at the same time : an outbreak of epidemic disease

pandemic: an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area (such as multiple countries or continents) and typically affects a significant proportion of the population : a pandemic outbreak of a disease, i.e. a global pandemic

endemic: 2: restricted or peculiar to a locality or region, i.e. endemic diseases. Used in a sentence:

The reality is that the virus will eventually become endemic, like many other pathogens that humanity lives with.— The Editorial Board, WSJ, 21 Dec. 2021

https://www.merriam-webster.com/

It turns out that a lot of people are talking about an endemic, with the general consensus being the Covid pandemic will evolve into an endemic in 2022. This year. Pretty much any day now. And that is a good thing, believe it or not.

Omicron might mark the end of Covid-19’s pandemic phase — unless a certain scenario happens, Fauci says. “A disease that is endemic has a constant presence in a population but does not affect an alarmingly large number of people or disrupt society, as typically seen in a pandemic.”

Doctor [Amesh Adalja, of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health] thinks COVID-19 will transition to endemic status in 2022. “Adalja said COVID-19 isn’t going anywhere but will likely transition this year to endemic status, meaning it’s always around but we have tools to fight it — things like monoclonal antibody treatments, antivirals and most importantly, vaccines.”

We are on track for Covid to evolve and be treated more like the flu. It’s only taken two years since the defeated former president “admitted to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward in early February that he knew the coronavirus was “more deadly than even your strenuous flu,” but the [defeated former] president continued to compare Covid-19 to the flu for weeks following his conversation with Woodward, claiming he “wanted to always play it down.” Forbes, All The Times Trump Compared Covid-19 To The Flu, Even After He Knew Covid-19 Was Far More Deadly

Life goes on, with any luck. I am double masking at work. I start every day with a smile, as soon as I look at a picture of my grandson. I further escape into books. And cooking/baking.

What’s Cooking

Here’s the best thing I made in January: Short Rib Onion Soup from Smitten Kitchen.

It is not a last minute dinner decision, a thirty-minute meal, or a sheet pan dinner, but you know what? Not everything has to be! It’s not made from pantry ingredients, either. I had to go shopping and buy short ribs and more onions and fresh thyme (my herb garden is dead) and a leek. On the plus side, I had some beef stock in the freezer that was going on six months old and needed to be used immediately, if not sooner. (Please don’t tell me we are all going to die because it was too old or whatever; I used it, we ate it, it was delicious, we lived.)

It took me a good part of the day to make this, but I didn’t mind a bit. First of all, it smells amazing every step of the way, from heavily browning the short ribs to braising them in the oven to caramelizing the onions to broiling the cheese toasts. You can make the short ribs a day ahead, if that helps. My husband and my daughter kept wandering in to see what was cooking, so that was fun.

By the time it was all ready, the incredible smells that had permeated the house all day had us so crazed and hungry we scarfed it down like we hadn’t eaten in a week. (Seriously, which means I didn’t get a picture, so I borrowed this one from Deb Perelman. Thanks, Deb!) Everyone loved it, and if you enjoy an occasional day of slow cooking, I promise you won’t be sorry you made this. (Other than the expense – short ribs are $$$) But I have enough left over for another dinner, and that will take less than thirty minutes. And something to look forward to – a new Smitten Kitchen Cookbook is coming in fall 2022!

Book News

This village was a book capital. What happens when people stop buying so many books?* This is a wonderful article in the Washington Post about Redu, Belgium, and how they saved this small village by opening bookstores. A lot of bookstores. If you’re familiar with Hay-on-Wye, this is the first “copycat” town.

F.B.I. Arrests Man Accused of Stealing Unpublished Book Manuscripts* The New York Times reported that Filippo Bernardini, an Italian citizen who worked in publishing, was charged with wire fraud and identity theft for a scheme that prosecutors said affected hundreds of people over five or more years.

A Library the Internet Can’t Get Enough Of* Why does this image keep resurfacing on social media? The New York Times investigates this viral photo of an incredible home library.

Finally, I can’t not mention Wordle. Back in December, I discovered this game (from my son? from an article? I don’t remember!) and I fell in love. In case you aren’t on social media, don’t listen to podcasts, or read the news, it is the latest fad to hit the pandemic. It’s an old school word game that you play on a bare bones website. No app. No ads. No sucking you in and playing all day because <gasp> there is only one puzzle to solve each day. It takes me anywhere from five to fifteen minutes to play and it is one of the most satisfying five to fifteen minutes of my day. There has only been one puzzle so far that I couldn’t solve (WHACK) and once I had a twofer – solved it in two guesses (MOUNT). If you want to try it, best hurry – the New York Times just bought it and will be (I’m sure) rolling it into their games app. Although they did say it will be free initially, so kudos NYT on that, for however long it lasts. And honestly, kudos to them for buying it, they could have created their own version. There have been several copycat versions with a twist, like Lewdle, Queerdle, and an archived version, and some wiseasses stole the game, turned it into an app, then tweeted about how they were monetizing it. Apple removed those apps from the App Store (and I’m assuming other app providers did as well, but I don’t know for sure.)

I think one of the most fun things about it is how easy it is to share on social media. You can show your score and it doesn’t give anything away. There’s a Facebook group, (probably several by now, but that’s the one I joined back when there were only a few hundred members – today there are 22,000!) It seems to be mostly on Twitter though, or at least it started out that way. It’s just the spot of fun that we all sometimes need in our day. I’ll write about my other word game obsession, the New York Times Spelling Bee, another day!

Play Wordle

The New York Times Buys Wordle

Listen to the NPR Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast on Wordle: Wordle is a daily dose of delight, despair, and sometimes smugness

The most common letters in Wordle

As always, thanks for reading and stay safe.

Something to look forward to – there are lots of great books coming out next year! Not that this year is done yet. I always feel bad for authors whose books come out in December. Especially novelists. They tend to get overlooked, especially by list makers and awards. December is a good month to publish cookbooks and coffee table books and other kinds of gift books.