Advent Book 1 – A story of travel and food

This year I bought myself a book Advent calendar from the Old Curiosity Book Shop (see their website here). I already subscribe to get a monthly parcel of five used books from the shop and have purchased their book packs in the past, especially during the lockdown period when I couldn’t get out much. Their Advent calendar came at the end of October and consists of 25 books, each wrapped separately and numbered with the day in December on which it is to be opened. I chose to have books about travel, memoirs and autobiographies (no celebrities), and literary fiction (no classics). It is likely that there may be books in the package that I have already read or books which I really don’t want to read but I calculate that if I get 15 new books out of the 25 which I will read then I am happy with the investment. It is likely, as with the monthly packs, that I will get books that I didn’t know about or which challenge me a bit.

Today, obviously, was the first parcel and I opened this bag this morning. The first book is Under a Mackerel Sky by Rick Stein. This is a memoir of the author’s childhood and his start in cooking (he is a well-known chef). It is possible that this veers a little too much into celebrity writing for me but the book is about a childhood and early adult life starting in Devon and then moving away as the author travels abroad. I am not over excited by cookery writing but there appear to be no recipes in the book. The cover and the presentation of the book seem to be positioning it as a serious read.

I am prepared to give this a try. I don’t know much, if anything, about Rick Stein but I like a good memoir. I know very little about cooking or the life of a chef or how you get into the culinary world and I always like to read about new things. The paperback edition I have is in very good condition which is nice, although not essential.

So, it’s a reasonable first book and one I will read. I will make a new pile of my Advent books and aim to read them all next year – it will be interesting to compare my first impressions with what I actually think when I read them.

I am already looking forward to opening book two.