Julie & Julia meets Jodi Picoult in this poignant and delectable novel with recipes, chronicling one womanâs journey of self-discovery at the stove.
After the unexpected death of her parents, shy and sheltered twenty-six-year-old Ginny Selvaggio, isolated by Aspergerâs Syndrome, seeks comfort in family recipes. But the rich, peppery scent of her Nonnaâs soup draws an unexpected visitor into the kitchen: the ghost of Nonna herself, dead for twenty years, who appears with a cryptic warningâbefore vanishing like steam from a cooling dish.
A haunted kitchen isnât Ginnyâs only challenge. Her domineering sister Amanda insists on selling their parentsâ house in Philadelphia, the only home Ginny has ever known. As she packs up her parentsâ belongings, Ginny finds evidence of family secrets she isnât sure how to unravel. She knows how to turn milk into cheese and cream into butter, but she doesnât know why her mother hid a letter in the bedroom chimney, or the identity of the woman in her fatherâs photographs. The more she learns, the more she realizes the keys to these riddles lie with the dead, and thereâs only one way to get answers: cook from dead peopleâs recipes, raise their ghosts, and ask them.
Offering a fascinating glimpse into the unique mind of a woman suffering from Aspergerâs and featuring evocative and mouth-watering descriptions of food, this lyrical novel is as delicious and joyful as a warm brownie.