[Vision2020] More Summer Reading...

[Debbie Gray]

I'd also like to add 2 books to my recently read or in process:

The Language of Baklava / Diana Abu-Jaber.  

Great memoir of her childhood and adult life as the daughter of 
a Jordainian father and American mother. Discusses food and 
culture and parental/child relationships and spun throughout are 
mouthwatering recipes.

The Mapmaker's Wife : A True Tale of Love, Murder and Survival 
in the Amazon  / Robert Whitaker

blurb from amazon.com because I can't summarize it myself =)
Whitaker merges a grippi:ng account of scientific exploration 
with an amazing story of survival in the wilderness. For those 
who think of the Enlightenment only in terms of sedate Paris 
salons, this book will alter that image forever. The best minds 
of Europe in the 1730s knew that the Earth was not perfectly 
round, but the exact size and shape were in hot debate. Someone 
figured out that to nail down the answer certain data was 
needed, and that the best place to get that data was at the 
equator. Given the technological and political realities of the 
time, that meant one place: Peru. A scientific expedition was 
organized in Paris and sent to the New World in 1735. After 10 
years of incredible hardships and setbacks, it accomplished its 
mission (and a host of other enlightenments along the way). As 
captivating as this story proved to be, another developed: a 
young member of the party met, fell in love with, and married an 
upper-class, 13-year-old Peruvian girl. Due to a tangled swirl 
of unfortunate events, this couple became separated for 20 years 
(beginning just before the birth of their only child). Finally, 
in 1769, Isabel Gramesón set off on a trek through the most 
inhospitable of jungles to rejoin her husband in French Guiana. 
The author's depiction of that harrowing journey is the crowning 
jewel of this outstanding volume.-Robert Saunderson, Berkeley 
Public Library, CA
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