The Cook

'A slim, bountiful, beautifully written (and gorgeously translated) 'Portrait of the Chef as a Young Man.'' --Nancy Klinke, The New York Times Book Review One of BBC Culture's Ten Books to Read this March and The Rumpus Book Club Pick for March Maylis de Kerangal follows up her acclaimed novel The Heart with a dissection of the world of a young Parisian chef More like a poetic biographical essay on a fictional person than a novel, The Cook is a coming-of-age journey centered on Mauro, a young self-taught cook. The story is told by an unnamed female narrator, Mauro's friend and disciple who we also suspect might be in love with him. Set not only in Paris but in Berlin, Thailand, Burma, and other far-flung places over the course of fifteen years, the book is hyperrealistic--to the point of feeling, at times, like a documentary. It transcends this simplistic form, however, through the lyricism and intensely vivid evocative nature of Maylis de Kerangal's prose, which conjures moods,