Kepler's 2020 Project in the News:
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Are you hungry for a good book? How about a book that is a gourmet banquet for even the most ravenous reader?
Something extraordinary happened as I was reading Monique Truong's exquisite second novel. The mesmerizing voice of the book’s young protagonist, Linda Hammerick, became a rare and succulent verbal delicacy. Linda has a secret, a neurological condition that causes an involuntary mixing of the senses, and this unusual gift enables her not only to hear words, but also taste them. The name of the boy she has a crush on tastes like orange sherbet (Wadeorangesherbet). Her beloved great-uncle has a name that tastes like celery. Back in the seventies, Linda and her best friend Kelly wrote letters to each other every day, and those pages are a nourishing soul food made from girlhood, friendship, and intimacy. They also foreshadow a secret correspondence between Linda's father and a young Vietnamese woman, a revelation that makes Linda realize that she harbors yet another secret, a secret concealed in those long-ago letters, the secret of why the bitter taste was her first memory. Truong's writing is a sensuous literary feast; it makes one want to read it aloud, to devour each word, to hear it and taste it, just like Linda, who longs for a certain word "like it was a spoonful of peach cobbler." -- Aggie Z. |
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