The ramen king and I

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For three days in January 2007, the most e-mailed article in The New York Times was Appreciations: Mr. Noodle, an editorial noting the passing, at age ninety-six, of Momofuku Ando, the inventor of instant ramen. The very existence of the noodle inventor came as a shock to many, but not to Andy Raskin, who had spent nearly three years trying to meet Ando. Why? To fix the problems that plagued his love life. The Ramen King and I is the true story of Raskins colossal struggle to confront the truth of his dating life, and how Momofuku Ando served as his unlikely spiritual guide. Raskins quest leads him to some unexpected placesfrom the Wharton School and Kmart headquarters to the Instant Ramen Invention Museum and a funeral in a baseball stadium and he eats a lot of Japanese food. Along the way, hes spurred on by cinematic samurai warriors, manga-based chefs, and the author Haruki Murakami. Charting Raskins pursuit of the elusive Ando, The Ramen King and I unfolds partly through frank, revealing letters addressed to the culinary sage. After devouring Andos books and essays, with titles such as Peace Follows from a Full Stomach and Mankind Is Noodlekind, Raskin ultimately discovers that he has been suffering from what Ando identifiedjust before inventing instant ramenas the Fundamental Misunderstanding of Humanity. A unique memoir of hunger in its many forms, The Ramen King and I is about how we become slaves to our desires, and how to break free.

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Becca

I came into this book with high expectations. Let's face it - it has probably the best title of any memoir in approximately the history of the universe.Unfortunately, the rest of the book does not live up, particularly. Raskin's epistolary memoir mostly focuses on his scummy, womanizing ways and his desire to make up for them. Somehow, he finds the motivation to make reparations for past misdeeds by writing a series of monologues addressed to Momofuku Ando, the inventor of instant ramen. Why Ando is a question frequently asked but never answered. Similarly, the “fixed my love life” subtitle may be a little oversold: the book seems to be more “How My Imagined Version of the Inventor of Instant Noodles Set Me on the Path to Fixing My Love Life, But I'm Certainly Nowhere Close to Fixed Yet, Because as an Adult Closer to a Midlife Crisis than a Quarterlife One, I'm Counting a Six Month Relationship as a Success.” I mean, I'm just saying...Interspersed with that is a series of anecdotes about Momofuku Ando's life, which are fascinating, but conveyed in a rather dry tone. The best part of the book are Raskin's frequent trips to Japan and his perception and description of the Japanese culture. But honestly, Japan as a comedy of manners has been done before in both fiction and nonfiction before. (e.g. [b:If You Follow Me 6391014 If You Follow Me Malena Watrous http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1278442263s/6391014.jpg 6579433])

March 2, 2012