Review of Secret Frequencies: A New York Education (American Lives) (Paperback)

Skoyles's "Secret Frequencies" is extraordinarily funny and moving--his sense of character is unbelievably vivid, as is his sense of what is at once dark and comic in a scene.This is the best memoir I've ever read of growing up with the hopes for a New York City, a life of bars and restaurants and clothes and taxi cabs, a life the narrator glimpses the summer he travels each day from Queens to work at Paramount Pictures in Times Square.Totally recommended!



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Review of The Rituals of Dinner (Paperback)

Margaret Visser's advice has been quoted on Sage Asian Advice on Soup Etiquette, and the advice looks to me entirely misleading.It reads: "A Chinese banquet often begins with fruit and ends with soup."Being a Chinese myself and have attended numerous banquets, I have never seen fruit being served at the beginning and soup at the end.It will help if Ms. Visser can clarify what kind of banquet she had actually observed or attended.The regular way is soup being served close to the beginning after the cold and hot appetizers, and fruit is served at the very end together with dessert.



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