The Road Home (novel)
Encyclopedia
The Road Home is a 2007 novel by Rose Tremain
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, reviewed the book saying, "A less disciplined and agile author might have been tempted to ease Lev’s transition from daydreamer to doer. Or she might have jollied Lev into a toque at London’s River Café and set Rudi up as a chauffeur on Belisha Road. But Rose Tremain is in the business of inventing not so much fantasies as alternate realities. In “The Road Home,” she lets Lev in on her secret: “Don’t think about Auror down there in the darkness. Don’t think about the past.” The present is also a work of imagination". A Guardian review says, "Tremain clearly enjoys observing wealthy Londoners, their vapidity, their selfishness, through Lev's eyes - and also more cheerfully enjoys describing the busy workings of a kitchen in a high-end restaurant. She recounts in succulent detail several of the meals Lev produces as he begins to hone his own culinary skills. Strangely, it is not until near the end that we are given the dishes particular to Lev's country (rabbit with juniper berries, seaweed ravioli)".
Rose Tremain
Rose Tremain CBE is an English author.-Life:Rose Tremain was born Rosemary Jane Thomson on August 2, 1943 in London and attended Francis Holland School then Crofton Grange School from 1954 to 1961; the Sorbonne from 1961–1962; and graduated from the University of East Anglia in 1965 where she then...
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Plot summary
The story concerns with Lev who is a middle-aged immigrant and widowed. He leaves Auror, a village in an unspecified eastern European country, when the sawmill closes. Soon after, he travels to London to find work so he can make money that he can send to his mother, his daughter that is 5 years old, and his best friend. He finds his first job at a Muslim kebab-shop, before washing dishes at a five-star restaurant named GK Ashe. Lev also meets a translator from his home country named Lydia, a divorced Irish plumber named Christy, a young chef named Sophie, and a rich old woman named Ruby.Reception
The author won an Orange Broadband Prize for this book. Liesl Schillinger, of The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, reviewed the book saying, "A less disciplined and agile author might have been tempted to ease Lev’s transition from daydreamer to doer. Or she might have jollied Lev into a toque at London’s River Café and set Rudi up as a chauffeur on Belisha Road. But Rose Tremain is in the business of inventing not so much fantasies as alternate realities. In “The Road Home,” she lets Lev in on her secret: “Don’t think about Auror down there in the darkness. Don’t think about the past.” The present is also a work of imagination". A Guardian review says, "Tremain clearly enjoys observing wealthy Londoners, their vapidity, their selfishness, through Lev's eyes - and also more cheerfully enjoys describing the busy workings of a kitchen in a high-end restaurant. She recounts in succulent detail several of the meals Lev produces as he begins to hone his own culinary skills. Strangely, it is not until near the end that we are given the dishes particular to Lev's country (rabbit with juniper berries, seaweed ravioli)".