Advanced
Error loading page.
Try refreshing the page. If that doesn't work, there may be a network issue, and you can use our self test page to see what's preventing the page from loading.
Learn more about possible network issues or contact support for more help.
Title details for Born Round by Frank Bruni - Available

Born Round

The Secret History of a Full-time Eater

by Frank Bruni
Frank Bruni
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
Borrow Listen to a sample Listen to a sample
1 of 1 copy available
The New York Times restaurant critic's heartbreaking and hilarious account of how he learned to love food just enough .
Frank Bruni was born round. Round as in stout, chubby, and always hungry. His relationship with eating was difficult and his struggle with it began early. When named the restaurant critic for The New York Times in 2004, he knew he would be performing one of the most watched tasks in the epicurean universe. And with food his friend and enemy both, his jitters focused primarily on whether he'd finally made some sense of that relationship. A captivating story of his unpredictable journalistic odyssey as well as his lifelong love-hate affair with food, Born Round will speak to everyone who's ever had to rein in an appetite to avoid letting out a waistband.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    August 20, 2009

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781101976302
      • File size: 274480 KB
      • Duration: 09:31:49

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      In his self-narrated memoir, NEW YORK TIMES restaurant critic Bruni reveals that food is everything to him--a substitute for love, a stress reliever, and a tangible link to his late mother and grandmother. He's sincere in his self-loathing, and that comes across in his performance. That's a little sad, and shallow. He succeeds in making the listener cheer him on as he grapples with a perceived weight problem. At times, he even sounds fat. But truthfully, Bruni is not really fat, a bit chubby perhaps. Dom DeLuise, John Candy, Orson Welles were fat. Bruni, his own worst critic, spends most of the book whining about needing to drop 10 or 15 pounds. This is America. Everybody could stand to lose 10 or 15 pounds. M.S. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from July 6, 2009
      Outgoing New York Times
      restaurant critic Bruni admits he was even a baby bulimic in his extraordinary memoir about a lifelong battle with weight problems. To his Southern Italian paternal grandmother, food equaled love. Cooking and parenting from Old World traditions, she passed these maternal and culinary principles on to her WASP daughter-in-law, whose own weight struggles her son eventually inherited. Through adolescence, puberty and into college, Bruni oscillated from gluttonous binges to adult bulimia, including laxative abuse. Vocationally, journalism called, first through the college paper, then a progression of internships and staff positions in Detroit and New York, including his stints as a Bush campaign reporter in 2000 and as the Times
      Rome correspondent. In tandem, Bruni's powerlessness over his appetite developed from cafeteria meals to Chinese delivery binges to sleep eating. While Bruni includes such entertaining bits as the campaign trail seen through Weight Watcher lens and ample meals from his years as the Times
      restaurant critic, in the end, his is a powerful, honest book about desire, shame, identity and self-image.

    • Library Journal

      Starred review from November 15, 2009
      Should best-selling author Bruni ("Ambling into History") ever tire of journalism, he could easily make a career out of audiobook narration. In this self-read memoir, he opens with his 2004 appointment as restaurant critic for the "New York Times", then tells of his lifelong struggle with food and weight (at his heaviest, he weighed 270 pounds). How he both deals with and fails to deal with his addiction to food makes this a fascinating listen. Compliments to Bruni for serving up such a candid and enthralling tale; highly recommended. [The review of the "New York Times" best-selling Penguin hc read, "Bruni's painfully honest, tartly humorous life story will]be a hit with anyone who has struggled with the numbers on the scale," "LJ" 8/09.Ed.]Cliff Glaviano, Bowling Green State Univ. Libs., OH

      Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from October 26, 2009
      More the gourmand than the gourmet, former New York Times
      food critic Bruni takes us through his love/hate relationship with food and catalogues everyone who ever fed him and what they served, every diet he went on and his fraught—even dangerous—relationship with food in this excellent memoir. Bruni is a talented reader with an intelligent voice, a perfect pace, impish humor and a contagious passion for his topic. Dieters may crumble under the weight of so many lavish descriptions of luscious treats, but Bruni's frank depiction of his eating disorders and his charismatic delivery make for memorable listening. A Penguin Press hardcover (Reviews, July 6).

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

Loading