Sourdough: A Novel
By: Robin Sloan / Narrated By: Therese Plummer
Length: 6 hrs and 47 mins
Oh Huzzah HUZZAH for this one!!!
Full disclosure? I’ve heard of the much-lauded writer Robin Sloan for quite some time now, but this is the first audiobook of his that I’ve listened to (And forGET about me reeeeeading a book of his in print!), and I oooonly dipped into Sourdough cuz it’s food-themed and heck! It’s Thanksgiving, so why not give it a try, eh?
I think I’ve used the word “delighted” soooo many times that p’raps it’s lost a bit of its usefulness to describe my feelings but…. I was delighted! oh so delighted! with every single thing about this audiobook!
Let’s start with Therese Plummer narrating as Lois Clary, our befuddled yet chock-full o’ chutzpah heroine! She’s from Michigan, but she’s just accepted a grand job in San Francisco. SF is an eye-opener and dazzler to her, but then her job gets rolling, and she starts crumbling under the weight of the mind-numbing work… and the Slurry sludge she’s advised to consume instead of food. When a flyer is tacked onto her door, advertising spicy spicy doings from Clement Street Soup and Sourdough, she numbly gives it a shot, ordering the Double Spicy which comes with a slice of sourdough bread. Upon devouring it… everything changes for her. She’s not? Wha? Braindead? anymore? She’s alive, so alive. She begins ordering every day, her order taken by the cook, Beo, and delivered by the music-loving brother. Soon she’s known as their Number One Eater, and her nights, which she might’ve spent mulling over just how terrible she’s doing at work, are now refreshed and redeemed.
But oh nooooo! Visa issues, and soon the Clement Street duo are on the run. But not before they stop to say farewell to their Number One Eater, and Beo gifts her their sourdough starter… which is kinda high-maintenance… when she has trouble keeping a cactus alive…
Just feed it every day, Beo assures her, and let it listen to music—This is a verrrrrry special starter indeed! And he leaves her with an email address so that she might send him all her stammered questions.
Soon, she is reveling in this special starter; after all, her lonely life is now shared with a MULtitude of microorganisms, and she’s trying her hand at baking. To all her Slurry-bored coworkers, she becomes a Bread Goddess, and this leads her to a place in a marketplace with newfangled foodie ideas (She was nixed by the regular fresh market crowd).
And she becomes (By demand) the dab-hand at combining technology with baking, purchasing and writing code for a robotic arm to assist her. The challenges are immense, but they’re enlivening. Whereas she’s a simple drone during her noons, the rest of her days she’s baking bread and palling around with her sourdough starter. But her starter is an enTIREly odd entity, and soon things go awry, demanding strange and decidedly odd solutions.
The magic keeps unfolding throughout this story, and it’s wonderful how Lois goes from being a bored and boring person with nothing to say to all the Loises she meets at The Lois Club, to someone who has definite stories to tell of her new days. Further, she’s got a neat little back and forth going with Beo via email where he keeps her abreast as he tries to fulfill his dream of having a little restaurant, just a few tables! as they cross the globe looking for space.
Therese Plummer was a MASTERful choice as narrator! She really breathed life into an already fantastic character like Lois whose moods seesaw wildly, and whose world around her alternates between ominous/confusing and ecstatic/energizing. The oomph oomph of music is conveyed as tho’ we’re listening to something from a wild rave, and then Plummer swings right back in, giving a magic sourdough starter all the life its gazillion and six microorganisms can provide. Multitudes live and die in the battles it undertakes, and Plummer amps up her delivery even as the narrative builds into an apocalyptic climax.
Truly, truuuuuly, TRULY a wonderful ride, and I can’t thank author Robin Sloan for being such a creative thinker, jamming in foodie Uber-trends and twisting it all together with memorable side characters. And just whoooo is the mysterious Mr. Marrow of this new food market? And why does he show up to address all the vendors as a Talking Fish?
It all winds up neatly at the end, a most satisfying conclusion.
Some reviewers wailed that Sourdough was nowhere near as wondrous as his previous book.
Reeeeally? I gotta ask. Cuz if that was better than this?
Oh jeez, I was just so tickled pink with this one that the joy of THAT one might just be tooooo much for this poor aging gal…!!!
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