Join us for a reading and signing with University of Georgia Press author Joseph Geha, who wrote Kitchen Arabic: How My Family Came to America and the Recipes We Brought with Us.

Immigrant children first speak the language of their mothers, and in Toledo, Ohio’s Little Syria neighborhood where Geha grew up, the first place he would go to find his mother would be the kitchen. Many of today’s immigrants use Skype to keep in touch with folks back in the old country but in those “radio days” of old before the luxuries of hot running water or freezers, much less refrigeration, blenders, or microwaves, the kitchen was where an immigrant mother usually had to be, snapping peas or rolling grape leaves while she waited for the dough to rise. There, Geha’s mother took special pride in the traditional Syro-Lebanese food she cooked, such as stuffed eggplant, lentil soup, kibbeh with tahini sauce, shish barak, and fragrant sesame cookies.

As much a memoir as a cookbook, Kitchen Arabic illustrates the journey of Geha’s early years in America and his family’s struggle to learn the language and ways of a new world. A compilation of family recipes and of the stories that came with them, it deftly blends culture with cuisine. In her kitchen, Geha’s mother took special pride in the Arabic dishes she cooked, cherishing that aspect of her heritage that, unlike language, has changed very little over time and distance. With this book, Geha shares how the food of his heritage sustained his family throughout that cultural journey, speaking to them—in a language that needs no translation—of joy and comfort and love.

Geha is professor emeritus of creative writing at Iowa State University. He is the author of Through and Through: Toledo Stories and Lebanese Blonde. He lives in Ames, Iowa.

This event is presented by the University of Georgia Press, The Athenaeum, and the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts and is a part of the UGA Humanities Festival organized by the UGA Humanities Council.

Scott Nadelson’s award-winning short story collection, While It Lasts (University of Georgia Press), brings us moments of tenuousness, in which characters seek out or struggle to hold on to what’s most precious in the face of change and loss. The stories take us from suburban New Jersey to prewar Vienna to Western Oregon, chronicling the lives of, among others, a suburban teenage boy taking revenge with a stolen Revolutionary War bayonet; a woman adrift, literally and figuratively, amid a workplace affair; a nearly forgotten and destitute musician attempting to reclaim his creative spark; and a young Mark Rothko finding his way after several early failures. While It Lasts speaks to how we are all bound by limited time to achieve what we must despite our own knowledge of how everything is fleeting. Nadelson will be joined in conversation by Justin Taylor, author of Riding with the Ghost.

More details here: https://www.powells.com/book/while-it-lasts-9798218043339/1-1

For further celebration details: [email protected]