Not getting much reading done these days - Winter blues, I guess. But one book I have finished was 'The Epicure's Lament' by Kate Christensen. Hugo Whittier is a trust fund boy, a recluse in the family estate, a boozer, a smoker, a screwer (literally and figuratively) of anyone he can, a lover of Montaigne and a gourmet cook. Into this mix we throw a sadsack brother who moves back home, an ex-wife, with a child in tow, who wants to reconcile, a gay uncle who also moves back home and Hugo's impending death from a fatal, obscure disease. Hugo is such an asshole, but slowly through his actions and his interior monologues he wheedles his way into your 'like' column with all-too recognizable frailties and foibles. This book is full of pith and arch statements, the humour is sarcastic and mordant rather than ha-ha funny, and you just might learn something about cooking. I mean, who besides TA, would know about the Roman foodstuff 'garum,' I ask?