The lunch line

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Christa Parrish

Liesl McNamara's life can be described in one word: bread. From her earliest memory, her mother and grandmother passed down the mystery of baking and the importance of this deceptively simple food. And now, as the owner of Wild Rise bake house, Liesl spends every day up to her elbows in dough, nourishing and perfecting her craft. But the simple life she has cultivated is becoming quite complicated. Her head baker brings his troubled grandson into the bakeshop as an apprentice. Her waitress submits Liesl's recipes to a popular cable cooking show. And the man who delivers her flour, a single father with strange culinary habits, seems determined to win Liesl's affection. When Wild Rise is featured on television, her quiet existence appears a thing of the past. And then a phone call from a woman claiming to be her half-sister forces Liesl to confront long-hidden secrets in her family's past. With her precious heritage crumbling around her, the baker must make a choice: allow herself to be buried in detachment and remorse, or take a leap of faith into a new life.

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Eça de Queirós

“Os Maias” conta a história da família Maia. Afonso da Maia tem um filho, chamado Pedro, tímido e nervoso. Pedro conhece Maria Monforte, filha de um negreiro e, contra a vontade de seu pai, casa-se com ela. A bela Maria apaixona-se por um italiano e foge com ele e com a filha, abandonando Pedro e o filho Carlos. Pedro, desgostoso, suicida-se. Carlos cresce criado pelo avô, forma-se em Medicina e parte para uma longa viagem pela Europa. De regresso, Carlos instala-se no Ramalhete, a casa de família, com o seu avô. Juntamente com o seu grande amigo João da Ega levam uma vida de ócio na sociedade Lisboeta, vivendo histórias repletas de festas e amantes. Surge então em Lisboa uma bela mulher, casada com um rico Brasileiro, por quem Carlos se apaixona e se envolve numa louca paixão. A história desenvolve-se de uma forma surpreendente, repleta de situações de mentira e conduta imoral, até revelar uma terrível relação incestuosa. Escrito pelo genial Eça de Queirós, é uma das mais importantes obras da literatura portuguesa.

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Mo Yan

When special investigator Ding Gou'er hears persistent rumors that there is cannibalism in the province called the Republic of Wine, he goes to learn the truth. Beginning at the Mount Luo Coal Mine, he meets Diamond Jin, legendary for his capacity to hold his liquor and fondness for young human flesh. A banquet is served during which the special investigator, by meal's end in an alcohol-induced stupor, loses all sense of reality. Interspersed are stories sent to Mo Yan himself by Li Yidou (aka Doctor of Liquor Studies), each one more mad than the next. Wild and politically explosive, The Republic of Wine proves that no regime can stifle creative imagination.

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Jacqueline Deval

Pomme is a beautiful young woman and a passionate cook in this blend of fiction and literary and culinary anecdote which includes recipes for Charles Dickens' champagne punch, Emily Dickinson's gingerbread, and Victor Hugo's favorite biscuits Tortoni.