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August 2008
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"In a letter dated 1973 or 1974, my adoptive mother writes to her family back in New Orleans that she and my father, on leave from Okinawa, have decided to adopt an infant girl. A newborn, abandoned on a doorstep. But, she writes, there is also another child who comes every day and jumps in our laps. I am the other girl. My mother continues to explain that I was found on a bench in the marketplace, cigarette burns stamped into my arms and shoulders. When the policemen finally brought me into the station, I told them defiantly that I was three years old, that I was called Chong Ae Kim and was waiting for my mother to return. I held up a scarred fist smeared with soot and starch and shook it at them." The couple adopts both children, but Sunée escapes her New Orleans upbringing when she hits college age and heads for Europe. While teaching English in Sweden, she meets Olivier Baussan, founder of L'Occitane, the fragrance and skincare products company. They start a fervid relationship and Sunée moves to France, where she struggles to feel comfortable in the privileged and sometimes smothering world Baussan creates for her. Two really strong aspects of Trail: Sunée has a lyric (but not overblown) way with language, and she knows how to move the story along. Also, without giving much away, she has the courage to not end the book on a high note or to tie up her story with a candy-coated ending. (Though she is currently the food editor at Cottage Living, so we know she eventually wound her way back to the States.) My one small quibble: The book includes recipes, and though I don't generally feel one way or another about food memoirs with recipes, these become intrusive sometimes. I longed for the narrative to continue without bumping up against the instructions for a croque madame. That said, there is an almond-saffron cake in there I'm itching to try ... |
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