Nonfiction Book Reviews

The following is a fantastic guest post by a fellow blogger, Jennifer L Price, here at Today.com. If you are interested in more of Jennifer’s writing, please check out her blog at Journeys and Adventures. She is an excellent writer, so be sure to give her lots of praise in the comment section! Thanks again, Jennifer!!

I should probably start this review by admitting that I’m a foodie; foodies are defined by Wikipedia as “amateurs who simply love food for consumption, study, preparation, and news.” Yup, that’s me - I like to make food, look at food, think about food, and, of course, eat food…so a book about a food writer attending the well-known Le Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris is exactly the kind of book I enjoy.

The Sharper Your Knife, The Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears in Paris at the World’s Most Famous Cooking School by Kathleen Flinn details her experiences as a former middle manager attempting to follow a life-long dream and navigate life in Paris after being fired from her job - while also trying to learn how to gut a trout without damaging the head, cook with rooster blood, and make the perfect 512-layer puff pastry.

The book is obviously about food; Flinn uses mouth-watering descriptions to illustrate the dishes she creates and enjoys: “My final menu [includes] fillet of veal in pastry, stuffed with apples, celery, and mousse de fois gras with Calvados sauce, endive flowers with marinara sauce, whipped cauliflower with salsify and roasted garlic, chanterelle mushrooms sautéed with parsley.” (Don’t worry if your stomach starts to growl while reading, more than 25 recipes are also included in the book!)

There is more to the book than the food, though - Flinn offers an honest portrayal of life in a challenging culinary school, including demanding chefs and competitive classmates from around the world. The facts used to support her story (like the history of Cordon Bleu and how restaurants started) add a fascinating background to the already enchanting Paris. Trips to the market and glimpses of the Eiffel Tower bring the city to life.

At the forefront, however, The Sharper Your Knife is a memoir. In addition to her culinary experience, Flinn honestly shares the stresses, joys, and trepidations of losing her corporate job, moving to a foreign country, discovering herself, and searching for love: “As in cooking, living requires that you taste, taste, taste as you go along—you can’t wait until the dish of life is done.”

So, foodies like me will definitely enjoy the book—as will anyone who ever thinks of starting over and following their dreams overseas. There’s quite a bit of French in the book and Flinn covers a lot of territory in a short amount of time, sometimes moving too quickly and seemingly glossing over important parts, so The Sharper the Knife, The Less You Cry gets a 4.5 out of 5 stars from me.

~Jennifer

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Again, you can find Jennifer’s blog at Journeys and Adventures - she writes about countries all over the world that she has visited, and that the tips and ideas that she has to make your trips more enjoyable and stress-free. Even if you’ve gone no further than your own backyard but you love to dream, you’ll love her site. Check it out!

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