The Recipe Box Book Review

The Recipe Box: Book Review by Arlene.

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Review:

I felt this was the perfect time of year, with autumn fast approaching, to do a review of The Recipe Box. My daughter Kim gave me this book as one of my Mother’s Day gifts this year.

This wonderful “sweet book” delves into the deep emotional ties of family and especially the relationships of mothers and daughters and grandmothers and great-grandmothers.

Four generations of women bound together by love and strength. The warm and heartfelt lessons, we as women, can learn from the strong loving women who came before us.

The main locale of this novel is the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and the beauty of Lake Michigan is prominent thorough out the novel. New Jersey and New York also play into the story line.

I could especially relate to the love story between the main female character and her love interest a guy from New Jersey. My oldest son and his wife and family live in Michigan and my husband and I live in New Jersey.

This family owns land and started the family business of a Family Orchard and Pie Pantry many years and generations ago and grew from there.

The lives of the four generations of women in this book was so interesting to me and I loved how the ending of the book ended like the beginning of the book began. It was a special touch that brought the story line all together and completed it.

The family in the story come from and live in Northern Michigan surrounded by Lake Michigan, that beautiful massive lake that is one of our country’s natural wonders. As you read along and get into the story you will be able to visualize and feel the wonders of Lake Michigan.

You will experience the strong will of the women in this family who own land and an apple orchard and pie pantry who contribute to all the hard work and toil it took to create a business of the most delicious apple, peach, blueberry, raspberry etc. pies and pastries that will make your mouth water.

They go through good times and bad times and hard times and most of all loving times that hold them all together.

Thank goodness as they describe their baked creations at the end of those chapters are the recipes so we the readers can choose to try and duplicate them in our own kitchens.

“The Recipe Box” and the keys to those recipe boxes that were handed down to each generation have a life of their own and are an intricate part of this wonderful book.

In this crazy, outside world we all live in today, I really enjoyed reading a book like this one. It took me away to a simpler time when life was not so complicated and at the same time incorporated the story line to today’s current world.

I have always had my own recipe box on top of my refrigerator. It almost looks like the recipe box on the cover of the book. I also have my mother’s recipe box that holds her recipes and I treasure them both.

As stated in the book, my recipe cards are also stained with spills and smudges and my own handwritten notes on the sides of the cards of my years of pulling them out and putting them on the table as I was baking or cooking. I always felt I should re-write the cards and pieces of paper over but now I will not do that so that my own daughter can see those stains and smudges and think of the times I cooked and baked those foods and desserts.

I also have 3 sons and they also know how to cook and continue to create our family meal traditions. My husband also cooks and bakes his family recipes and his own inspired creations…and that is sure okay with me!!

I really enjoyed reading this book and the story of these 4 generations of women who loved and inspired each other throughout their lives.

This book is entertaining, inspiring and delicious!!

As Laura Lane McNeal author of Dollbaby says on the back of the book jacket “The Recipe Box is as tantalizing as an apple baking in butter and cinnamon, enlivening the senses in a way that reminds us that the heart never forgets where it belongs.”

My closing thoughts on The Recipe Box are the life lessons “The only constant in life is change.”

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Check out our book club discussion questions for The Recipe Box!