[FROM FACEBOOK]

** Sue: **I’ve noticed that I enjoy first novels. So far, so good with this one!

[Following review from iRead on Facebook]

The Invisible Bridge

By Julie Orringer

Julie Orringer’s astonishing first novel, eagerly awaited since the publication of her heralded best-selling short-story collection, How to Breathe Underwater (“fiercely beautiful”—The New York Times;“unbelievably good”—Monica Ali), is a grand love story set against the backdrop of Budapest and Paris, an epic tale of three brothers whose lives are ravaged by war, and the chronicle of one family’s struggle against the forces that threaten to annihilate it.

Paris, 1937. Andras Lévi, a Hungarian-Jewish architecture student, arrives from Budapest with a scholarship, a single suitcase, and a mysterious letter he has promised to deliver to C. Morgenstern on the rue de Sévigné. As he falls into a complicated relationship with the letter’s recipient, he becomes privy to a secret history that will alter the course of his own life.

Meanwhile, as his elder brother takes up medical studies in Modena and their younger brother leaves school for the stage, Europe’s unfolding tragedy sends each of their lives into terrifying uncertainty. At the end of Andras’s second summer in Paris, all of Europe erupts in a cataclysm of war.

From the small Hungarian town of Konyár to the grand opera houses of Budapest and Paris, from the lonely chill of Andras’s room on the rue des Écoles to the deep and enduring connection he discovers on the rue de Sévigné, from the despair of Carpathian winter to an unimaginable life in forced labor camps and beyond, The Invisible Bridge tells the story of a love tested by disaster, of brothers whose bonds cannot be broken, of a family shattered and remade in history’s darkest hour, and of the dangerous power of art in a time of war.

Expertly crafted, magnificently written, emotionally haunting, and impossible to put down, The Invisible Bridge resoundingly confirms Julie Orringer’s place as one of today’s most vital and commanding young literary talents.

From the Hardcover edition.

————

Bill: I’m reading, and quite enjoying, The Passage by Justin Cronin. But it’s slow going because with over 700 pages in hardcover, it’s quite heavy, literally as well as figuratively.

I usually wait for books to come out in soft-cover form, for economical reasons, though even pocketbooks are quite costly, especially when one reads as much as Mariette and I do. But a few years back, I got back into buying hardcover books on sale as bargain books — usually $5 to $10.

But the reviews for The Passage made me want to get this one right away.

A few weekends ago, there was quite a sale on books at Chapters/Indigo, including The Passage, released just five days previously, on sale for $16 compared to the reg. price of $32 and change.

Before heading to the store, I went online to check out a few of the hardcover books they had on sale for $5. While online I was reminded that the books are even cheaper if bought online. The difference is relative slight but is significant if buying several at a time. So that’s what I did.

Of course you can opt for free shipping if your purchases total more than $39, which ours always seem to do, quite easily.

Free shipping can take longer, but I usually buy the books and forget about them until they arrive a few to several days later. However, in this case, I ordered eight books (all hardcover) on Saturday, June 12 and they arrived at our door — to Mariette surprise and delight — on Monday, June 14.

For the curious, and since I just refreshed my memory by looking up my confirmation e-mail from Chapters/Indigo, the books I bought were:

1 – The Passage $16.47

**2 – **Wolf Totem $7.99

**3 – **Careless In Red $5.00

**4 – **Anathem $5.00

**5 – **Bright Shiny Morning $5.00

6 – The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo $21.12

7 – The Girl Who Played With Fire $21.12

8 – The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest $21.12

Some may recognize the last three as the famous Millennium Trilogy by the late Swedish author Stieg Larrson. Mariette had borrowed, read and returned the books and Travis has his own set in Toronto, but I wanted to read these books. Besides, they were all on sale from their reg. price in the $32 range.

Too much information? LOL

Anyway, I too enjoy first novels but I usually try them out when they hit the Bargain Books stage. Granted, some have been duds, but most are at least worth the price I pay, or more. And I have discovered some fine authors this way.

Looks like you found a really good one that I’ll have to check out. Thanks for the tip.

OK, enough’s enough. Before I turn THIS into a book. LOL

[DON’T MISS RECIPES BELOW**]**

**[**Recent exchange on Facebook]

**BILL: **Wonder if I can sneak in a game or two of soccer, on the X-Box 360, while the meat loaf cooks. Guess I should put it together and put it in the oven before I try. LOL

CATHY: LOL How was the meat load ;->>

[Editor: OMG. Just realized she was teasing me about my typo (“meat load”) and NOT expressing interest in how the meat l-o-a-f turned out. Oh well, gonna push on with this anyway. (g)]

**BILL:**First off, never got that game in. Mis-remembered the recipe, thinking it was bake in oven for 60 minutes, take out and do something, put back in for another 60 minutes. Turned out to be 30 + 30 and by the time I got it finally prepared and into the oven, M was home. So I took a break and sat with her while I sorted through the fresh spinach, … See Morediscarding some and de-stemming where necessary. Some went into my trademark spinach salad and the rest into the steamer as the main vegetable. (The recipe book shows peas but M isn’t too fond of them.) But I digress … as usual. (g)

**BILL: **Anyway, M REALLY liked the meat loaf. Me, I rather liked it at first bit after a while, it got to be too much for me. (Forgot the title of the recipe is SPICY Barbecued Meat Loaf.) LOL Also too much barbecue sauce, but then that was one of MY errors. This recipe is from a fairly short (128) pages but pretty cool hardcover recipe book called Cook Once, Eat Twice, which we picked up an sale (bargain table) at Indigo/Chapters for only $5 last weekend. It’s by Favourite Brand Name Recipes (www.fbnr.com) and is cool because it gives you the recipe for one meal, then a different recipe for the next day, using the leftover (on purpose) meat from the first meal. For more about this, and the recipes, see my Blog Surfacing (http://bi.provick.ca/) where I am just about to post said stuff. I think people might find it worth their while to check out the meat loaf recipe, and the one for the day after. 🙂

Anyway, here is the recipe, plus the one for the next day, which I’m not using this time around. (Going tonight with leftover Spinach Fettucine With Mushroom Sauce (from another $5 bargain, The Essential Pasta Cookbook, from Bay Books); the leftover meat loaf, and fresh cauliflower, steamed.)

Spicy Barbecued Meat Loaf

Makes 4 servings plus leftovers for leftovers for Easy Melt Patties

[ = Things I did differently, listed after the recipes.]*

Ingredients

1 to 2 slices rye bread, torn into pieces*****

1 large onion, cut into chunks

3 cloves garlic, peeled

1 tablespoon of butter

1 pound ground beef chuck*****

1 pound bulk pork sausage*****

2 eggs

¾ cup hickory-flavoured barbecue sauce, divided*****

¾ teaspoon salt*****

¼ teaspoon black pepper*****

Directions

Preheat oven to 375°F. Line shallow roasting pan with foil.

Place bread in food processor*****; pulse until crumbs form. Transfer ¾ cup bread crumbs to large bowl. (Any remaining crumbs may be frozen for up to three months.) Add onion and garlic to food processor*****; process until finely chopped.

Melts butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onion and garlic; cook 6 minutes***** or until softened, stirring occasionally. Let cool 5 minutes.

Add beef, sausage, eggs, ¼ cup barbecue sauce, salt and pepper to reserved bread crumbs. Add onion mixture; mix well. Transfer meat mixture to prepared pan*****; shape into 9×6-inch oval.

Bake 30 minutes. Spread remaining ½ cup barbecue sauce over meat loaf.***** Bake 30 minutes more***** or until internal temperature reaches 160°F. Let stand 5 minutes before slicing*****.

Reserve and refrigerate leftover meat loaf for Easy Patty Melts.

Easy Patty Melts

Ingredients

** **2 to 3 tablespoons of butter, divided

1 large onion, thinly sliced

8 slices rye bread

8 slices cheddar or mozzarella cheese

Leftover meat loaf from Spicy Barbecued Meat Loaf

Directions

Heat 1 tablespoon of butter in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion slices; cover and cook 5 minutes or until onion is transparent. Uncover; cook 8 to 10 minutes, stirring frequently, until,onions are golden brown and very tender.

Top 4 bread slices with cheese slices; spoon onions evenly over cheese. Arrange slices of meat loaf over onions. Top with another cheese slice and remaining bread.

Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in large skillet over medium heat. Add 2 sandwiches; cook 6 to 8 minutes per side or until golden brown and cheese is melted, turning every 2 minutes. Repeat with remaining sandwiches, adding butter to skillet as needed to prevent sticking.

So, there you go folks. I hope you will try at least the meat loaf dish. And though I’ve only tried one recipe from each book so far, I’ve browsed both and DO recommend Cook Once, Eat Twice (FBNR) and The Essential Pasta Cookbook (Bay Books), which includes photos of the different kinds of pasta and tips on making your own pasta.

And now, things I did wrong … things, right or wrong, that I did differently, where indicated above with *****:

*** **Used several pieces of bread and froze excess.

***** Used 1 pound of lean ground beef, from our butcher, because that’s what I had on hand.

***** Sausage M picked up at my request had the word “Mild” on the package and were a bit light orangish, suggesting they were a little spiced. Well the recipe did say “Spicy” but I might have preferred more plain pork sausage. Then, perhaps, when mixing, my fingers wouldn’t have turned so light orange. LOL

***** Didn’t have no “hickory-flavoured barbecue sauce.” Only two I had on hand (usually have more kinds) were Bulls-Eye Honey Garlic and Bulls-Eye Chicken & Rib Renegade. I went with the Chicken & Ribs because I REALLY like this sauce when BBQing chicken or ribs.

***** Always put less salt and pepper in dishes than recipes usually call for, figuring if anyone wants more, then can add it themselves.

***** Went with my Magic Bullet device, smaller and handier and does bread crumbs real well. (Bread crumbs may be the ONLY thing it does real well.)

***** It sure don’t do garlic and onions very well. “Finely chopped”? Was more like instant mush. (sigh)

***** Garlic-and-onion mush didn’t take no six minutes to cook.

***** Didn’t have no 9×6 (-inch) pan. DID have a 23.5 cm x 13.3 cm metal loaf pan. For the non-metric, that’s 9½ inches by 5½ inches.

***** OK. Here’s where I realized I’d goofed, I’d gotten distracted and made an ERROR! When getting the BBQ sauce, I looked at the ingredients and saw “¾ cup” and got out the appropriate measuring cup. However, it turned out that I had maybe between one half and one third cup of sauce left. So I kept swishing a little bit of water around inside until I had three-quarters of a cup of slightly watered down BBQ sauce. To compound matters, I MISSED (forgot about?) where it said to add just ONE-QUARTER-CUP of BBQ sauce to the meat mixture. I calmly through in ALL three quarters of a cup. Which would probably explain why MY meat loaf was so moist (watery?). (sigh)

***** With no half-cup of BBQ sauce to add at the 30-minute mark, I just cooked the darn thing for a full hour. However, probably due to the moisture, it took about 15 minutes more to get to the 160°F mark.

***** Fortunately, cooking turned most of the moisture into greasy juice, which was easily drawn away using a baster. But when I did try to slice the loaf, well, I ended up mostly with big chunks. LOL

Despite all this, the meat loaf was VERY good. Next time, I would just make sure that I, as instructed, used ONLY one quarter cup of non-watered-down BBQ sauce in the meat mixture. I think it was “too much BBQ sauce” that saw me get only half-way through the small mountain of meat loaf I’d put on my plate. Only got half-way through my small mountain of garlic mashed potatoes too. (My mom used to call that having eyes that were bigger than your stomach.) I DID however GLADLY eat ALL MY SPINACH! (vbg)

In the end, all I can say is bon apetit. 🙂