Jean Patrick Nkuba, the central character in Running the Rift, grows up in Rwanda as a smart and talented Tutsi boy who aspires to one day make running the center of his life. As his desire to become Rwanda’s first Olympic medal contender in track increases, Hutu-Tutsi tensions escalate and begin to tear apart Jean Patrick’s life and his country. He is forced to make difficult decisions as the killing begins and the lives of his family, friends, and the woman he loves are endangered. Benaron’s descriptions of Rwanda are wonderful and her characters are emotionally captivating. Once you pass this book on to your friends and family, they’ll understand why you kept slipping away to read by yourself.

See below for an excerpt. We have 3 copies to give away. Want to win one? Just leave a comment here or on our Facebook page. Good luck!

–Irene Newman

Praise for Running the Rift:

“In Naomi Benaron’s Running the Rift, a novel full of unspeakable strife but also joy, humor, and love, ‘hope always [chases] close on the heels of despair,’ thanks to a writer who knows when to keep a steady pace and when to explode into an all-out sprint.”—O: The Oprah Magazine

“An auspicious debut … Having worked extensively with genocide survivor groups in Rwanda, Benaron clearly acquired a very lucid sense of her characters’ lives and of the horrors they endured … While it would be counterintuitive to pronounce this a winning, feel-good story, there is something to be said for hope restored. And Naomi Benaron’s characters say it well.”—The Daily Beast

“Benaron writes with self-assurance, intelligence, and a rare musicality that keeps the reader glued to what’s understandably wrenching subject matter. Her prose, while beautiful, is unsparing, and she doesn’t understate the horrors of the genocide. She is a breathtakingly compassionate writer, one who doesn’t fall into the trap of condescension that befalls many Western authors.”—Michael Schaub, Publishers Lunch

“The politics will be familiar to those who have followed Africa’s crises (or seen Hotel Rwanda), but where Benaron shines is in her tender descriptions of Rwandan’s natural beauty and in her creation of Jean Patrick, a hero whose noble innocence and genuine human warmth are impossible not to love.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“Benaron accomplishes the improbable feat of wringing genuine loveliness from unspeakable horror… It is a testament to Benaron’s skill that a novel about genocide … conveys so profoundly the joys of family, friendship, and community.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“First novelist Benaron, who has actively worked with refugee groups, won the 2010 Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction for this unflinching and beautifully crafted account of a people and their survival. In addition, she compellingly details the growth and rigorous training of a young athlete. VERDICT Readers who do not shy away from depictions of violence will find this tale of social justice a memorable read, and those interested in coming-of-age stories set in wartime will want it as well. Highly recommended; readers who loved Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner will appreciate.”—Library Journal, starred review  

About Broadway Baby:

As a little girl growing up in Boston, Miriam Bluestein fantasized about a life lived on stage, specifically in a musical. Get married, have a family—sure, maybe she’d do those things, too, but first and foremost there was her career. As a woman, she is both tormented and consoled by those dreams in her day-to-day existence with her family, including a short-tempered husband, a cranky mother, and three demanding children, one of whom, Ethan, shows real talent for the stage.

It is through Ethan that Miriam strives to realize her dreams. As she pushes him to make the most of his talent, the rest of her life gradually comes undone, with her husband becoming increasingly frustrated and her other two children—Sam, a mass of quirks and idiosyncrasies, and Julie, hostile and bitter—withdrawing into their own worlds. Still Miriam dreams, praying for that big finale, which, when it comes, is nothing that she ever could have imagined.

Broadway Baby marks the fiction debut of a nationally acclaimed award-winning memoirist and poet, “an acute observer of moments, people, art and language [who] packs even seemingly simple stories with many layers of meaning” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

Praise:

“If his book elicits sorrow it’s due to Shapiro’s smashing ability to portray Bluestein as a romantic . . . Broadway Baby is an ordinary story told extraordinarily well. Bluestein is as flawed as any human but is heroic all the same.” – Louisville Courier-Journal

“When great poets like Shapiro write their novels, they bring their powers of wordsmithery to the page . . . They do more than simply describe the action, so that the pleasure of reading a good story is enhanced.” – Durham Herald-Sun

“Shapiro . . . offers an endearing, witty, and heart-warming take on family life . . . Equally sad and laugh-out-loud funny and boasting a cast of vibrant characters, this book is sure to hit a nerve with readers, no matter what their background. Readers will find themselves alternately rooting for Miriam and for her much-suffering family members. Sure to be a favorite.”– Library Journal

“How do you put into words thunderous applause, curtain calls and a standing ovation? That’s what I send out to Alan Shapiro’s remarkable debut novel, Broadway Baby, a beautifully written, often hilarious, memorably moving account of the one and only Miriam Bluestein’s greatest performance:  her life.”– Jill McCorkle, author of Going Away Shoes

Read an excerpt:

See below for the cute book trailer and to read an excerpt. Also: We’ve got 3 copies up for grabs! Want to win one? View the (brief) trailer and let us know which example you like best–you can leave your comment here or on our Facebook page.

Mei-Ling Hopgood, a first-time mom from suburban Michigan—now living in Buenos Aires—was shocked that Argentine parents allow their children to stay up until all hours of the night. Could there really be social and developmental advantages to this custom? Driven by a journalist’s curiosity and a new mother’s desperation for answers, Hopgood embarked on a journey to learn how other cultures approach the challenges all parents face: bedtimes, potty training, feeding, teaching, and more.

Observing parents around the globe and interviewing anthropologists, educators, and child-care experts, she discovered a world of new ideas. The Chinese excel at potty training, teaching their wee ones as young as six months old. Kenyans wear their babies in colorful cloth slings—not only is it part of their cultural heritage, but strollers seem outright silly on Nairobi’s chaotic sidewalks. And the French are experts at turning their babies into healthy, adventurous eaters. Hopgood tested her discoveries on her spirited toddler, Sofia, with some enlightening results.

This intimate and surprising look at the ways other cultures raise children offers parents the option of experimenting with tried and true methods from around the world and shows that there are myriad ways to be a good parent.

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“So many things are possible just as long as you don’t know they’re impossible.”

– The Phantom Tollbooth, Norton Juster, 1961

“And half the fun of nearly everything, you know, is thinking about it beforehand, or afterward.”

– Uncle Wiggily’s Story Book, Howard R. Garis, 1921

“You can’t expect two stars to drop in the same field in one lifetime.”

– Mary Poppins, P.L. Travers, 1934

“Everybody walks in the street, more or less straight down the middle, and if a car comes while somebody’s having a good conversation or telling a good story, the car has to wait till the story finishes before people will move out of the way. Stories are important here, and cars aren’t.”

– The Most Beautiful Place in the World, Ann Cameron, 1988

“You must not hop on Pop.”

– Hop on Pop, Dr. Seuss, 1963

Six Good People

They had never seen each other, or even heard of each other, yet they were from the same city, and were destined to enter heaven on the same day and hour. Now they were standing together, waiting for the pearly gates to open unto them. Mrs. Lancaster was a fine old lady with white hair carefully dressed and beautiful clothes. Her eyes were bright and piercing, her nose aristocratic. Her mouth was stern and humorous and imperious.

Michael Carstairs had been on the earth only six years. His tan hair was ruffled all over his head, and his large wistful eyes were gazing wonderingly around him. Occasionally he would glance down at his thin legs encased in a heavy brace, and a great hope would spring into his face.

Mrs. Amanda Griggs waited shyly, twisting her gnarled hands through her black and white checked apron, or pushing back a wisp of iron-gray hair. Her wrinkled face was full of confident expectancy, and her old eyes shone with childlike faith.

Young David Mallinson stood dreamily, occasionally running his long slender hands with the spatulate fingertips through his wild brown hair, or playing a fragment of a great composition as though he sensed shining ivory keys under them.

Grenfell Dredge sketched rapidly on a small pad with quiet precision, moving his fingers over his neat mustache, his scholar’s mind succeeding in absolute concentration.

Little Nan held an old rag doll in her arm and sang to it softly, thinking with all her energetic young brain. She watched the others, and after a while went and stood next to Michael, but said nothing.

And so these six good people were admitted together into heaven. The great pearly gates drew apart in a burst of joyful music, and they stepped in, the proud Mrs. Lancaster leading.

She found herself in a great ball room hung with magnificent crystal chandeliers. The music was coming from an orchestra at the far end. She stopped in front of a mirror, and saw herself young again, arrayed in the gorgeous silks and satins of her youth, her young head poised proudly, her dainty feet tapping the floor in time with the music. In a moment she was waltzing away on the arms of a young gallant. After a time there was a stir of excitement. Murmurs of “the great LaFayette!” went around. And suddenly she saw him standing before her, asking her to dance. It was the greatest honor any young girl could have. Her eyes shone and she graciously gave him her arm. “Oh, heaven!” she murmured to herself.

Closely following Mrs. Lancaster through the gates was the young Michael Carstairs. As he entered another boy came up to him, grinned pleasantly and said “Hullo! You’re the new one, aren’t you? We’ve been expectin’ you. You’re just in time for the race. Come on. You’re going to run, of course, aren’t you? We all do.” Michael looked down at his leg. It was sturdy and strong. Eagerly he followed the other boy, and in a few moments he was running down a long level course, easily keeping up with the rest. In a while he found only two boys ahead of him, the freckled lad who had met him, and a long thin one with red hair. He breathed hard and drew level with the thin boy– then the freckled one– then he was in the lead– and he had broken the tape. Great cheers were shouted, and the freckled one and several others bore him off on their shoulders. He sat upright, looking as though it didn’t matter. “This is heaven,” he thought.

Amanda Griggs edged humbly in, and suddenly found herself in a great city with golden streets and voices singing in beauty. She looked at herself, and she was clad in a long white robe, and great wings were folded behind her. She raised her hand, no longer gnarled, and felt tentatively above her head. Yes, there was the halo. A great joy ran through her, and though she had never seen a harp before, she sat down before one and with the air of one greatly practiced drew her fingers across the string, and sweet music came forth. “Heaven at last!” she sighed.

David Mallinson followed the quavering Mrs. Griggs. As he stepped through the gates a great clapping arose, and he found himself in a great auditorium facing a vast audience, and bowing, once, twice, thrice. Then, slowly he raised his baton and the music came softly from the orchestra, rising, rising, into magnificent beauty. The audience sat spellbound; no one moved. David was inspired with tremendous genius, and the music was so wonderful that it filled him with awe. “It is heavenly,” he thought.

Grenfell Drudge put his pad into his pocket, followed the others and stepped through the gates into a great observatory. A magnificent telescope occupied most of the space, and as he walked over to it he thrilled with indescribable awe– for this was the telescope that he had always dreamed of, the one that would show him far more than man had yet been allowed to see. As he put his eye to it he murmured “Ah heaven. Perfect knowledge!”

Nan entered last, into a most beautiful garden full of thousands of flowers, or were they flowers? Why no, of course not, they were fairies. A beautiful one fluttered up to her and in a voice that sounded like the tones one would imagine blue Canterbury bells would make swinging in the breeze told Nan that the fairy queen desired her presence. Nan eagerly followed her to a flower of perfect whiteness on a long slender green stalk. The fairy queen sat regally in its cup, dressed in a gown of rose petals. “Oh, beautiful heaven!” whispered Nan.

And so, these six good people together entered the gates of heaven.

“If you cannot be satisfied with what you have, you must learn to be satisfied with what you haven’t.”

– Further Tales of Mr. Pengachoosa, Caroline Rush, 1967

“About what’s wrong with grown-ups … is that they think they know all the answers.”

– The Changeling, Zilpha Keatley Snyder, 1970

“Animals belong to the earth. That grace of God we pray for in church–that must be what the animals have already.”

– Dobry, Monica Shannon, 1934.

“One doesn’t contradict a hungry tiger.”

– My Father’s Dragon, Ruth Stiles Gannett, 1948

“Poetry and Hums aren’t things which you get, they’re things which get you. All you can do is go where they can find you.”

–The House at Pooh Corner, A.A. Milne, 1928

“DO NOT CATAPULT THE CARROTS!

DO NOT JUGGLE GOBS OF FAT!

DO NOT DROP THE MASHED POTATOES

ON THE GERBIL OR THE CAT!”

– “My Mother Says I’m Sickening”, The New Kid on the Block, Jack Prelutsky, 1984

;

It isn’t the flavor of celery that I hate so much, it’s the texture. Perhaps a different part of the plant would be more acceptable to my discerning palate. I had never seen a celery root, and it took a little extra searching in the produce department to locate. It smells like celery, but fruitier, and it roasts up wonderfully, adding a nice depth of flavor to this soup. Best of all, no strings!

I used a homemade chicken stock and white wine, as well as my favorite kitchen gadget–the immersion blender–to make this perfect winter soup. Enjoy!

-Katie Ford

For anyone else who may be unfamiliar, that is a celery root.

Roasted Celery Root, Potato, and Cauliflower Soup with Tarragon

Yield: 4 servings

1/2 pound Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and diced into 1-inch cubes
1/2 pound celery root, peeled and diced into 1-inch cubes
1 head cauliflower, divided into florets
8 garlic cloves, whole and unpeeled
7 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
1 1/2 cups chopped onion
4 bay leaves
2 sprigs fresh thyme
3 3/4 cups chicken stock, preferably homemade
1 cup dry white whine or dry vermouth
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon (substitute parsley if you don’t have tarragon)
Salt and pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F

2. Place the potatoes, celery root, cauliflower, and garlic cloves on a baking sheet. Add 1/4 cup of the olive oil and toss with your hands to coat all the pieces equally. Season with salt and pepper and slide in the oven. Roast 15 minutes, turn the vegetables, roast 15 minutes more, turn once again, and roast for a final 10 minutes. Remove from the oven. Peel the garlic cloves and discard the papery skins. Reserve 2 of the handsomest cauliflower florets and set apart from the remaining roasted vegetables.

3. Heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and sweat until soft and transparent, about 4 minutes. Add the roasted vegetables (but not the 2 reserved cauliflower florets), bay leaves, thyme, chicken stock, and wine or vermouth. Season aggressively with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, cover, drop the heat to low, and simmer 15 minutes to allow the flavors to mingle.

4. After the soup has finished simmering, discard the bay leaves and thyme sprigs. Pour the soup into a blender and pulse until just pureed (or use an immersion blender). Return to the saucepan and bring to a simmer.

5. To serve, ladle servings of soup into bowls. Slice the 2 reserved cauliflower florets in half. Place half a roasted floret in the center of each bowl of soup. Top with a large pinch of fresh tarragon. Drizzle the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil over the soup bowls and serve immediately.

 
I love soup, I just wish it were more photogenic. You’ll have to take my word for it that my reserved cauliflower floret was in fact the “most handsome.”

My Mother’s Bread Stuffing

Stuffing for a 12- to 15 pound turkey or 2 5-pound chickens

1 large yellow onion

5 stalks celery

3 carrots

7 tablespoons olive oil

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

2-3 cloves garlic, slivered

1-2 whole cloves

1 teaspoon allspice

Zest of 2 oranges

1 1/2 cups dried apricots, slivered

1 1/2 cup dried cranberries

6 ounces chicken livers

2 loaves slightly stale peasant bread, preferably not sourdough

1/2 cup toasted pine nuts

1/2 cup coarsely chopped sage

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

2 cups chicken stock

Kosher salt and fresh-ground pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

2. Dice the onion, celery, and carrot uniformly. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil and 1 tablespoon of the butter in a skillet and saute the vegetables with the garlic until soft and translucent. Add the cloves and allspice, half of the orange peel, and the apricots and cranberries, stir together, and cook 3 or 4 more minutes on low heat. Remove and cool in a wide bowl.

3. Separate the lobes of the chicken livers, trim the veins, and dice into 1/2-inch cubes. Season with salt and pepper. Heat 1 tablespoon each of the oil and the butter and saute the chicken livers until firm, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat, allow to cool, and add the vegetable-fruit mixture.

4. Cut the bread into bite-sized chunks, discarding the top and the bottom crust. Toss with the cooked liver and the vegetable-fruit mixture. Fold in the toasted pine nuts and 1/4 cup chopped sage.

5. Drizzle with vinegar and chicken stock. Taste for seasoning, adding more salt or vinegar if the stuffing tastes bland, and enough chicken stock to keep it moist

6. To stuff the cavity of a turkey or other fowl, season the cavity with salt and fresh-ground pepper and gently scoop the mixture to stuff the bird. You will have some left over to bake separately. Pile the remaining stuffing into a buttered baking dish and gently pat down for an even surface.  Dot the top with the remaining butter, cover the stuffing with foil, and bake 1 hour.

7. For a 15-pound stuffed turkey, season the outside generously with salt and fresh-ground pepper, the juice of 2 oranges, and the remaining olive oil. Tuck the remaining orange peel and chopped sage between the breast and the skin. Place on the middle rack of the oven and roast for 4 hours, basting frequently and covering with foil once the bird is a rich golden brown. Remove from the oven. Cover loosely with foil and allow to rest 30 minutes before carving.

Jhonathan and the Witches

Once upon a time there was a boy named Jhonathan. He was smart, handsome, and very brave. But Jhonathan was a cobblers son.

One day his father said, “Jhonathan, you must go seek your fortune. You are old enough.”

Jhonathan, being a smart boy knew he better ask the King for work.

So, he set out.

On the way, he met a rabbit who was a fairy in disguise. The scared thing was being pursued by hunters and jumped into Jhonathans arms. When the hunters came up Jhonathan pointed excitedly and shouted, “That way, that way!”

After the hunter had gone the rabbit turned into a fairy and said, “You have helped me. I will give you three wishes. What are they?”

But Jhonathan could not think of anything, so the fairy agreed to give them to him when he needed them.

So, Jhonathan kept walking until he made the kingdom without incedent.

So he went to the king and asked for work.

But, as luck would have it, the king was in a very bad mood that day. So he vented his mood on Jhonathan.

“Yes, there is something you can do. On yonder Mountain there are three witches. If you can kill them, I will give you 5,000 crowns. If you cannot do it I will have your head! You have 20 days.” With this he dismissed Jhonathan.

Now what am I to do? thought Jhonathan. Well I shall try.

Then he remembered the three wishes granted him and set out for the mountain.

***

Now Jhonathan was at the mountain and was just going to wish for a knife to kill the witch, when he heard a voice in his ear, “The first witch cannot be pierced.

The second witch cannot be pierced or smothered.

The third cannot be pierced, smothered, and is invisible.”

With this knolege Jhonathen looked about and saw noone. Then he remembered the fairy, and smiled.

He then went in search of the first witch.

At last he found her. She was in a cave near the foot of the mountain, and was a mean looking hag.

He remembered the fairy words, and before the witch could do anything but give him an ugly look, he wished she should be smothered. And lo! It was done.

Now he went higher in search of the second witch. There was a second cave higher up. There he found the second witch. He was about to wish her smothered when he remembered she could not be smothered. And then before the witch could do anything but give him an ugly look, he had wished her crushed. And lo! It was done.

Now he had onley to kill the third witch and he would have the 5,000 crowns. But on the way up, he was plagued by thoughts of how?

Then he hit upon a wonderful plan.

Then, he saw the last cave. He waited outsid the entrance until he heard the witches footsteps. He then picked up a couple of big rocks and wished.

He then wished the witch a normal woman and lo! She became visable and then Jhonathen struck her dead with the rocks he had.

Jhonathen collected his 5,000 crowns and he and his father lived happily ever after.

But which recipe to make on one of the first chilly nights? One of the many things I love about Bill Smith’s Seasoned in the South is that he groups recipes by the season. And so all I had to do was flip to the Fall section and there it was, my recipe: Pork Roast with Sauerkraut (see recipe at bottom). (No, not a recipe for you vegetarians, all of whom I admire and wish I was equal to, in your ability to subsist without meat. But the fact is that I’m from German stock and I believe we are weaned on meat.)

Bill Smith has a classic recipe that, like all of his recipes, provides the most simple directions, almost like he’s standing next to you chatting. And with full respect to the season, he uses those great root vegetables that are at their height in the Fall (carrots, parsnips), and above all, the much-underappreciated sauerkraut.

But first, before I could get underway, I had to have an altercation with the produce man in Whole Foods, who refused to believe that anything called “bagged sauerkraut” existed, even though the recipe called for it. “Nope, it would never be bagged,” he said. “It comes in a jar. Sorry.” Slightly defeated, I moved onto the meat department to order my Pork Butt (always fun to say), where I saw, in the cold case right below the counter, my BAGGED SAUERKRAUT. See picture below, in case you ever have to hunt this down.

After that, though, everything was smooth sailing. This recipe practically makes itself. You salt and pepper your pork butt, sear it all over in the Dutch oven, pack some sauerkraut around it, add some parsnips and carrots cut into thick slices—

–more sauerkraut–

some chicken broth, a sprig of fresh rosemary, and then put it in the oven for two hours. And of course Bill recommends mashed potatoes on the side, because what else goes with Pork Roast?

The pork, as the recipe predicted, became soft and tender, falling away from the bone. The sauerkraut added that vinegary edge to the meat, which went perfectly with the carrots and parsnips. And afterwards, I felt like I should till the fields or split some wood or go ice-fishing. Which is to say that it feels like the kind of food that sticks with you, or that, were you have a power outage and all the local grocery stores simultaneously ran out of food, if you had just eaten this for dinner, I think you’d be fine for at least a week. Or more. Yes, it’s comfort food, but I’d also call it Survival Food. There must be a long German word for that.

Pork Roast with Sauerkraut

Serves 6 generously

1 pork roast (perhaps 3-4 pounds of Boston butt)

2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 tablespoons bacon grease or cooking oil

2 pounds sauerkraut (bagged, not canned), rinsed

3 large carrots, peeled and sliced thickly

3 large parsnips, peeled and sliced thickly

1 sprig fresh rosemary

2 cups chicken stock

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Rinse and pat dry the roast.  Salt and pepper the roast and brown it on all sides in the bacon grease in a Dutch oven with a tight-fitting lid.    After the roast is browned, pour off the oil and tuck in half of the rinsed sauerkraut all around the roast halfway up the Dutch oven.  Add the vegetables and rosemary and cover the rest with sauerkraut.  Add the stock.  Cover and bake for 2¼ hours until the meat is tender and easy to pull from the bones.  Serve with mashed potatoes.