Review: Sourdough
Robin Sloan
Read: 12/08/17 - 12/09/17
🌟🌟🌟🌟
Summary:
Lois Clary, a software engineer at a San Francisco robotics company, codes all day and collapses at night. When her favourite sandwich shop closes up, the owners leave her with the starter for their mouthwatering sourdough bread.
Lois becomes the unlikely hero tasked to care for it, bake with it and keep this needy colony of microorganisms alive. Soon she is baking loaves daily and taking them to the farmer's market, where an exclusive close-knit club runs the show.
When Lois discovers another, more secret market, aiming to fuse food and technology, a whole other world opens up. But who are these people, exactly?
My thoughts:
Sourdough was a quick, foodie read. I think the setting of San Francisco was perfect. I could not imagine another city hosting an underground farmer’s market, merging food and technology.
Lois is a new baker, who reminded me of my first bread adventures. Although I did not have such a lively sourdough starter (or a robot arm helper).The book reminded me of the smell of the yeasty starter and the warm scent of baking bread. It did get me in the mood to start baking again!
About to-thirds into the book, it goes from a light story about an software engineer / amateur baker’s adventure in caring for bread starter, into something deeper. Lois realizes that the sourdough starter is filled with microorganisms. The microorganisms live, breed, make war, and die. Their lives are likened to human existence. It has an existentialism feel.
But it doesn't get too deep or for too long; this quick, engaging read was complete with apocalyptic puff pastries and heroic goats. I enjoyed it.
I hate spoilers. But the only reason that this did not get 5 stars was the ending. So obligatory Spoiler Alert!
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
I did feel like the love story at the end was forced. Lois moved to Berlin for someone she’s met in person once. And there was no relationship basis, they were barely friends.We never see Lois’ half of the emails. If Robin Sloan had kept the stories separate, he could have had two happy endings instead of one.