The Hereford Times

No burnt offerings with this month's title

12:11pm Thursday 6th December 2007

THIS month's book in our new Book Group is Nigel Slater's Toast - the Story of a Boy's Hunger.

Anyone who was a child in the 70s and 80s will undoubtedly experience more than a few glorious moments of sharp and joyful recognition, moments when you can almost taste the long-forgotten foods he describes.

If you have ever licked out the inside of a Walnut Whip, winced at the hiss and crackle of Space Dust or fished the skin off a cooling mug of cocoa, you'll love Nigel Slater's account of his childhood and adolescence, punctuated at every turn by food.

But this is a memoir about much more than food. While it is an account of a less-than-happy childhood, it is a million miles from the "misery memoirs" which fly off bookshelves these days. It is the story of how Nigel Slater's love affair with food began, a story that, like life, is funny and tragic by turns.

His mother, whose cooking was "always a shadow of what it was meant to be", was a chops-and-peas sort of cook who found it all a bit of an ordeal.

She died when he was nine, leaving him with his father, a man who could occasionally go off "crack like a gun".

"I had yet to turn an oven on or light the gas," he says, going on to recount how he began cooking for his father in an attempt to please him.

The attempt turned into a battle for his father's affection, when Joan Potter arrived to keep house and later marry Tony - "I want to tell him how she won't let me make toast when I come in from school."

As he approaches adolescence, though, the young Nigel finds another way to cook and his journey towards life as a much-loved food writer had begun.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAID.

"This touching memoir proves Nigel Slater is more than a cookery writer. Its emotional impact will strike a chord with many."

- Sunday Mirror "A vivid record of people whose lives never warrant the study of historians, biographers or even novelists... wonderful... extraordinary."

- Observer.

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT.

l How would you categorise the book? Is it a misery memoir, or something more?

l How much does the detailed evocation of Nigel Slater's childhood foods contribute to a sense of the world he lived in?

l Do you remember your own childhood in terms of food? Or did reading Toast act as a catalyst to your own memories?

l How closely connected are your memories of food and of feelings?

HOW TO ORDER YOUR COPY OF TOAST ...and other titles by Nigel Slater.

Toast RRP £5.99 Offer price £5.69 Eating for England RRP £16.99 Offer price £15.29 The Kitchen Diaries RRP £16.99 Offer price £15.29 Real Cooking RRP £12.99 Offer price £11.69 Real Fast Food RRP £8.99 Offer price £8.54 Real Fast Puddings RRP £9.99 Offer price £9.49 The 30-minute Cook RRP £12.99 Offer price £11.69 Thirst RRP £12.99 Offer price £11.69 Appetite RRP £20.00 Offer price £18.00 Real Food RRP £16.99 Offer price £15.29 To order any of the titles listed call the Hereford Times Bookshop on 08700 713 317 or send your cheque/postal order made payable to Hereford Times Bookshop to: Hereford Times Bookshop, PO Box 60, Helston, TR13 0TP. Please allow 7-10 working days for delivery. All titles supplied subject to publisher availability.

WHAT YOU THOUGHT OF LAST MONTH'S CHOICE - THE MYSTERIES OF GLASS.

"Living in the 21st century, it's hard to believe that a relationship like the one in the book could have caused such outrage. It made me feel grateful that this kind of repression doesn't exist any longer, but sad as well that we've gone so far in the other direction. There are lots of things in the novel that made me think how different life is now in many respects but also how much the same it is in others."

"Sue Gee is brilliant at describing place and atmosphere - the detail in her writing is amazing. It's a bit like watching a film as she manages to create vivid pictures in words."

"It seemed to take ages for anything to happen, and I found that frustrating. I prefer fast-moving stories and though I can see this is beautifully written I'd have liked more action."