I'm going to take advantage of Nonfiction November to review all the nonfiction books I read this year. Two books from November are My Korean Deli and Vanished Smile: The Mysterious Theft of Mona Lisa.
read by Bronson Pinchot
The author, an editor at The Paris Review with George Plimpton, along with his wife, decide to buy a deli for his mother-in-law, a Korean immigrant. The author suffers from culture shock all around him - at home living with his in-laws and working at the deli in the evening. A self-proclaimed WASP from New England, working in a Brooklyn deli with his hard working mother-in-law showcases all his differences. Pinchot does a great job reading, and the story is easy to listen to. George Plimpton is also a character in the story, because I think he was a character wherever he went. I like reading about life in New York and quite enjoyed this slice of life memoir.
In 1911, Mona Lisa disappeared from the Louvre. She stayed missing for 2 years before reappearing. The mystery is never completely solved, but this book looks at several theories, the facts of the case, and all the related information about Paris, art forgery and theft, and how Mona Lisa went from a painting on the wall to the most famous and loved painting in the world. I quite enjoyed following the trail of clues and the side tracks that make up the whole story.
