In The Kitchen
Monica Ali
£17.99
Description
At the once-splendid Imperial Hotel, chef Gabriel Lightfoot is trying to run a tight kitchen. But his integrity and his sanity are under constant challenge from an exuberantly multinational staff, a gimlet-eyed hotel management, and business partners with whom he is planning a new venture. Despite the pressure, his hard work looks set to pay off.
Until the discovery of a porter’s dead body in the kitchen appears to tip the scales. It is a small death, a lonely death – but it is enough to disturb the tenuous balance of Gabe’s life.
In The Kitchen is Monica Ali’s stunning follow up to Brick Lane. It is both the portrait of a man pushed to the edge, and a wry and telling look into the melting pot which is our contemporary existence. It confirms Monica Ali not only as a great modern storyteller but also an acute observer of the dramas of modern life.
Publisher Review
A novel of quiet pleasures, with a perplexed hero who always rings true. * Mail on Sunday * Her descriptions of Gabe's disassociated states are excellent...this is an ambitious book from a writer not content to revisit familiar territory...Serious and intelligent. * Independent * Ali's strengths lie in a cool authorial distance, and a passion for detail * The Times * A compelling story..Ali is second to none when it comes to capturing modes of speech...Monica Ali is shaping up to be a fine novelist * Sunday Express * The kitchen of the title is the Imperial Hotel in central London, and Ali's dazzling accounts of its manic goings-on make the chef Anthony Bourdain's gory memoir, Kitchen Confidential, seem as genteel as Fanny Cradock. * Sunday Times *
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