When I picked up Elizabeth Bard’s wonderful foodie memoir, Lunch in Paris, I’m not sure what I was expecting. I mean, I knew the story of a young American woman in Paris wasn’t going to be about the side effects of diet pills or overspending with credit cards, but I think I was expecting something more like Julie and Julia.

What I got was sort of Adam Gopnik with food. This memoir begins at lunch, quickly moves to the author’s then lover’s (now husband) flat, and then into the kitchen before going back to bed. As I do, she associates food with highs and lows in her life, and has a recipe – familiar or French, sometimes both – for every milestone in her life. Her tales of going to the market are completely envy-inspiring, and her description of standing in her tiny kitchen licking the knife after making a flourless chocolate gateau are drool-worthy.

Bard is a journalist, by trade, of course, so it helps that she already knows how to hook a reader. I’ve never read any of her magazine writing, but I love her writer’s voice in this book, and really hope she does more like it. Soon.

And yes, I have tried at least one of the recipes.

Goes well with: a dry cappuccino and a single square of dark chocolate

I initially picked up Three Cups of Tea some time last year, in the same shopping trip that included picking up a couple of different anti aging creams for my mother, having my hair done, and spending some time alone with a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich at Barnes and Noble. I didn’t actually read it until recently, however, because it got lost in my house – so lost, that I actually picked up a second copy thinking I’d never purchased the first!

I’m glad I finally read this book though, because the story is beautiful. I mean, I disconnected a bit in the first third of the book when author Greg Mortenson, whose story this is, was living in his car to save money so he could get back to Pakistan, but by the time I got to the end of his book – which is really just the beginning of his legacy – I was completely invested in the man and his mission.

For the five people who haven’t read it, Three Cups of Tea is the story of an American mountain climber who fails to reach the summit of K2, becomes severely ill during his descent, and gets lost in a remote corner of Pakistan, where local villagers take him in, help him recover, and essentially adopt him. As thanks, he promises to return and build a school where the young women of the village can be educated. He eventually makes good on his promise, first building a bridge, then the first school, then heading a foundation with a mission of building more schools in Pakistan, all for educating women and girls, while still being respectful of local religion and customs.

And to top it all off, this is all taking place at the very beginning of the Taliban’s rise to power.

While, at times, my not-so-inner snob found her skin crawling at the less-than-pristine conditions of Mortenson’s living arrangements, I finished the book with tears in my eyes. I feel this book should be required reading for everyone, everywhere.

Goes well with: Tea and flat bread.

by Malcolm Gladwell

I was first introduced to Malcolm Gladwell’s work via my stepfather, who left me his copy of Blink when he was visiting us over Christmas in 2006. I thought that book was amazing, with all of the insights about the first few split-seconds of every encounter.

The Tipping Point is amazing, but in a quieter way. It’s about social and medical epidemics – about how word of mouth works, about the different types of personalities that drive hot-or-not trends, and about how the two merge in almost every aspect of society. In the journey of this concept, the author talks about needle exchanges, AIDS Patient Zero, vintage shoes, Paul Revere’s ride, and various examples of information collection and critical mass.

There’s really no way to review it without spoiling the experience. Read this book.

Gringos in Paradise: An American Couple Builds Their Retirement Dream House in a Seaside Village in Mexico

by Barry Golson

I found this book in the new fiction section at my local B&N, and brought it home even though it’s not fiction, because my parents also did the cash-out and move to Mexico thing. You would think I’d therefore be predisposed to like it, and while it wasn’t a bad read, the truth is that I spent more time being pissed because I feel my mother could tell her, similar story, with more humor and less of a patronizing tone.

Granted, Golson’s mission is NOT to be patronizing, and I’m sure any other reader probably wouldn’t see it as such. He relays slice-of-life stories about how difficult it really is to adjust to the Mexican culture, and provides an appendix with useful information.

It’s interesting how our own experiences color even the most innocuous books.

Poignant and relevant, Patricia Klindienst’s first book is a collection of essays, portraits of different immigrant gardeners and how they have retained their unique cultures through seed and soil, while blending into American society at the same time. The book takes us from Connecticut to California, from the Low Country to land-locked New Mexico, introducing us to vibrant individuals whose passion for the earth is only rivaled by the author’s own.

Herself a master gardener, Klindienst’s voice is much more akin to Studs Terkel as she shares these stories, and while there is an undertone of politics, and the importance of sustainable food use, it is the humanity that shines in this book.

The only flaw is a lack of photographs – gardens are meant to be seen, after all – and one wonders if a coffee-table style presentation might not have been more effective.

The trade paperback edition of The Earth Knows My Name will be released in April, 2007.