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Nonfiction. HTML:A 2020 Audie Award Finalist One of AudioFile's Best Audiobooks of 2019! Now a limited Netflix series starring Zoe Saldana! This Reese Witherspoon Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller is "a captivating story of love lost and found" (Kirkus Reviews) set in the lush Sicilian countryside, where one woman discovers the healing powers of food, family, and unexpected grace in her darkest hours. It was love at first sight when actress Tembi met professional chef, Saro, on a street in Florence. There was just one problem: Saro's traditional Sicilian family did not approve of his marrying a black American woman. However, the couple, heartbroken but undeterred, forged on. They built a happy life in Los Angeles, with fulfilling careers, deep friendships, and the love of their lives: a baby girl they adopted at birth. Eventually, they reconciled with Saro's family just as he faced a formidable cancer that would consume all their dreams. From Scratch chronicles three summers Tembi spends in Sicily with her daughter, Zoela, as she begins to piece together a life without her husband in his tiny hometown hamlet of farmers. Where once Tembi was estranged from Saro's family, now she finds solace and nourishment�??literally and spiritually�??at her mother-in-law's table. In the Sicilian countryside, she discovers the healing gifts of simple fresh food, the embrace of a close knit community, and timeless traditions and wisdom that light a path forward. All along the way she reflects on her and Saro's romance�??an incredible love story that leaps off the pages. In Sicily, it is said that every story begins with a marriage or a death�??in Tembi Locke's case, it is both. "Locke's raw and heartfelt memoir will uplift readers suffering from the loss of their own loved ones" (Publishers Weekly), but her story is also about love, finding a home, and chasing flavor as an act of remembrance. From Scratch is for anyone who has dared to reach for big love, fought for what mattered most, and those who needed a powerful reminder that life is.… (more)
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I love the way the book flips back-and-forth between the history of their courtship and marriage and then his death and the time thar followed. It worked much better than a linear timeline. Tembi’s relationship with her mother-in-law, Nonna, was the most quietly powerful piece of the story. Each chapter felt as aich and flavorful as the Sicilian dishes described within its pages.
“She was telling me that throughout life, we revisit the empty spaces. That was her understanding of grief. That we are always trying to reconcile memory with reality. The tooth was a metaphor for all the missing things we lose in life."
"But what I loved most was that her kitchen showed me how one ingredient can be made into many different dishes. Her food spoke of malleability and resourcefulness in loss, in love, and in life."
While in Florence Italy as an exchange student Tembi met the man of her dreams. Saro was Sicilian, a chef, and more than a decade older than Tembi. She was an African-American college student, with attorney parents from Houston Texas. It was love
And then he got cancer.
This is a wonderful memoir full of love and tenderness, grief and frustration, joy and a sense of belonging.
Locke narrates the audiobook herself. I cannot imagine anyone doing a better job. Brava!