291295 Fri Dec 20 21:00:15 -0800 2002 4 27 General Chowhounding Topics 0 1584455 I just got finished with this book while on vacation and can't say enough about it. Anthony Bourdain is a great story teller and gives you a sense that you should stay away from a professional kitchen if you are the least bit timid. He also gives many tips on what to and not to have in a restaurant. I laughed outloud many times and was finding myself wanting to read excerpts outloud to my wife. The first third of the book was the most fun I have ever had reading and the last 2/3 were still great. The characters (you won't believe they are real) are crazy and at times make you cringe because of the way they act and the way they live. Fri Dec 20 21:00:15 -0800 2002 0 John Scar 1 1584633 It was a good read. Pretty accurate decription of the life too. I found I was less interested than many others I've talked to, since I have experienced many of the things he described. I.E. others were shocked,and my responmse was, "Oh yeah, I remember a guy like that, etc." Anyone read his newish book "Cooks Tour"? Wondering if it's worth it, or if it's too commercialized from Tony's forray into cable TV. Mon Dec 23 14:00:15 -0800 2002 1584455 0 SLRossi 2 1584640 Just finished a Cooks Tour, and would recommend it if you have a crush on Tony Bourdain, like me. His stories of Vietnam and Cambodia really primed me for my recent trip. Note, I have only seen a couple of episodes of the TV show, so I can't comment on the potential redundancy of reading a television program. Mon Dec 23 15:11:59 -0800 2002 1584633 0 yumyum 1 1584638 I thought it was hysterically funny, too, and I don't usually like that hypermacho style. What surprises me is that from the comments I've heard, people tend to take it seriously as a "shocking" expose of the restaurant industry, which it clearly is not (read Food Nation if you want that!). This book is about his experiences, and it is obvious (or at least it was to me) that while some of them might be typical of the industry, some of them were only applicable to a small segment of the industry and some of them were idiosyncratic to him. Mon Dec 23 15:02:45 -0800 2002 1584455 0 Ruth Lafler 2 1585117 ... that would be Fast Food Nation. Mon Dec 30 06:14:27 -0800 2002 1584638 0 Katerina