More for the Bookshelf

A while ago when Alejandro and I were walking along Paseo de la Reforma, we passed through the touristy neighborhood known as the Zona Rosa on our way to catch the Metrobus back to the apartment.  We stopped for a break at a branch of "El Péndulo", a chain of bookstore / coffee shops in Mexico City.  I have been to the one in Condesa several times, but this was the first time I had ever been to the branch in the Zona Rosa.

Whenever I am in a bookstore here I like to see what they have in the way of books in English, and I ended up returning to the apartment with a bag full of books.

My first find was a large, beautifully illustrated cookbook of Mexican cuisine.  While some of the recipes are quite complicated or do not interest me, there are quite a few that look interesting and relatively easy to prepare.  When I am feeling ambitious, I might try some of them out.

The second book is the Lonely Planet guidebook to Mexico.  I have always enjoyed looking through guidebooks ever since my first trip to Mexico as a college student more than fifty years ago.  Back then I traveled with a copy of "Mexico on 5 and 10 Dollars a Day".  (Do any of my readers remember that series of books that obviously are no longer around?  Nowadays, five dollars in Mexico might get you breakfast at an inexpensive restaurant or a meal at a street food stand!)  Over the years I have had many guidebooks to different countries.  Lonely Planet publishes books for destinations all over the world.  I have had a few of their books, but I never had their book on Mexico.  Having played "tour guide" myself quite a few times, I now tend to look at guidebooks with a critical eye.  I started browsing through Lonely Planet's chapter on Mexico City, and I already found a couple bits of misinformation.

"The Book Thief" by Markus Zusak tells the story of Liesel,  a young girl growing up in Nazi Germany.  In the novel Liesel's love of reading is a symbol of personal freedom.  I saw the movie which came out in 2013, and I thought that it was excellent.  I'm sure that the book will also be excellent.

Finally, I bought "Love in the Time of Cholera" by the acclaimed Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez.  It is one of his most famous novels, arguably second only to his masterpiece "One Hundred Years of Solitude".  I have to admit that I do not remember if I have read the book or not.  I know that I definitely saw the 2007 movie version.  It won't hurt to read it again.