I "met" Faye Kellerman when I read her early mystery, Ritual Bath, years ago. I loved it -- and its focus on Orthodox Judaism. (The plot involved a mikveh, for example.) Her writing was superb and the use of Judaism informed and smart. When her main characters married later in the series, and then a daughter became a cop, the place of Judaism shifted and shifted again. But, throughout these many changes, Kellerman's emphasis has been very different from her husband Jonathan's. Reading The Garden of Eden and Other Criminal Delights was fun -- and sort of light weight. The volume includes short stories both new and previously published as well as a bit of autobiographical reflection. Nothing challenging -- and yet Kellerman does manage to show you her capacity to write in different ways. She also provides a glimpse of her moral commitments beyond those contained in her novels. (Though like many mystery authors, hers are morality tales as well.) Alas, the stories -- like her more recent novels in my experience -- are thinner in some ways than that early novel. (That seems to be a widespread trend; startlingly wonderful debut novels are followed by thinner writing and plotting. Maybe the terrible impact of market success? And depending on one's name to sell rather than one's writing? The failure seems endemic -- and the counterexamples relatively few. Sometimes the best hope is for unevenness -- rather than a mere down hioll trajectory.) Despite this, I enjoyed the book -- and read it quickly!
But what does this have to do with food? Kellerman concludes the anthology with a piece entitled "The Summer of My Womanhood," an autobiographical look at her teen years (before dental school and before murder mysteries) working alongside her father in his deli. She begins small (both physically and in terms of the work allotted to her) and eventually runs the bakery section. Reading this alongside her mystery stories helps them resonate a bit more -- with the smells and sounds of a deli, and with the brisk nostalgia of Kellerman's reflections on her father, dead at 53, and quite obviously mourned. I found myself drifting into nostalgia for my own father, dead at 63, and still a voice in my life. I never worked alongside him (though I did eat plenty of hoagies we bought together). When I look back, though, I know I carry him with me as Kellerman quite obviously carries her father. And this time of year, I think of him. I think of cooking turkeys when I came home from college (complete with my grandmother's bread stuffing recipe and my aunt making gravy) while my mother typed my papers. I think of being spoiled. With nostalgia.
