'Trail of Crumbs' Didn't Lead Anywhere

Last night book club met at Sue's house. A delight, as always, though I wish I could say that about our book, 'Trail of Crumbs' by Kim Sunee.

First - The Menu:

• Spicy edamame and cucumber kim chee (a nod to Sunee's Korean heritage) and a delicious assortment of soft and hard cheeses greet us. We ate them up!
• Sitting down to the table - a small bowl of soup, but such soup that my tongue did a little dance. Chicken, herbs, shitake mushrooms, and lemongrass - yum!
• Then, a platter of herbed and grilled lamb sliders, to be nestled in soft potato buns, and topped with mango/onion chutney. Grilled veggies (to die for) and green salad complemented.
• Depending on your color choice - Boom Boom Shiraz or a lovely pinot grigio.

Our usual 6 was augmented by Sri, Sue's wonderful man, Sri's daughter, Meleana, and Dale's visiting brothers Ian and Darren, and Darren's lovely wife Catherine. Quite a raucous crowd.

Once we got done licking our lips and toasting to the cook (who uses no recipes EVER, by the way) we unleashed our thoughts and feelings about this book.

In my humble opinion, 'Trail of Crumbs', a memoir mostly of Sunee's tumultuous 20's seemed to me a publisher's ploy.

Here's what I heard in my brain:
Publisher: 'Memoirs are selling like hotcakes. Gotta get on that Elizabeth Gilbert train. Oh, and stories with food are good too. Remember that Esquivel watery chocolate book? Oh, oh - and you're adopted, so hunger for identity and mouth watering recipes. That goes together, right?'

Now, with all due respect, Kim Sunee is an established food writer and cook with some very interesting life experiences and relationships. I would truly enjoy eating almost anything Ms. Sunee cooks; however, from this book, I didn't like Ms. Sunee very much. This seemed to be the consensus at the table; however, opinion varied, as usual.

Dale and Sue really emphasized how much they enjoyed the sensuousness of the book. All senses were stroked and imagining the vistas of Provence and the steamy wafts of cooking from Sunee's kitchen were delightful. Ian (a guest contributor) noted that the scenes created in the kitchen, around the dinner table, in the market and traveling through Europe were sublimely accurate in their feel.

While we all loved the aspects related to the food and the sensual moments, we agreed that Ms. Sunee was not all that likable in how she portrayed herself. Tess, who gave the book our highest rating, had somewhat of an affinity for her as she reminded her of many of her students at Hawaii Pacific University, who she loves dearly. I however, did not like her, as her incessant melancholic self absorption reminded me a bit too much of my own 20's and who wants to do that again?

Ostensibly Sunee's theme was her search for identity and belonging. We followed her from New Orleans, to Sweden, to Provence, to South Korea and then Paris, while she navigated a relationships with a millionaire, a self obsessed poet, and her own adopted family. All the while we hear Sunee's dreary train of thought about how everyone is mean to her. Of course, that's a simplification, but that's what it felt like.

Nikolai thought that the structure and flow of this book was out of sorts. He noted that it read a lot like a journal. Pondering that comment, I agree - a teenage girl's journal, albeit, one who can write.

While the first third of the book was really quite delicious, the last part wallowed. Even the recipes at the end of the chapters began to seem slapped on simply to fill the format.

Ratings:
Nikolai - 4
Sue - 5
Craig - 5
Catherine - 6
Tess - 8
Dale - 5 (I think)

All in all - we liked, in a lukewarm way, but nobody's keeping this book.

Then we went off to the living room where we admired and splayed ourselves on Sue's new furniture and ate ice cream with peppermint bark, listened to Christmas music and old Phoebe Snow, and generally enjoyed each other.