Read for a dose of nitty-gritty Brooklyn. ( )

This book was fascinating! Wow! I now know that I DO NOT EVER want to own a convenience store! But I loved the stories about the crazy customers. I also really enjoyed the stories of George Plimpton, Ben's boss at the Paris Review. (Ben was an editor of the Paris Review, plus he owned a convenience store with his Korean wife and her family.)

I learned a lot about New Englanders and Koreans from this book, or at least the author's impressions of those cultures.

It was mildly amusing and parts of it did drag a little bit, but all-in-all, I enjoyed it. I couldn't put it down there toward the end. There's good times and bad times and some sad times in this book but it was very enlightening.
( )

More entertaining than I expected it to be. And fairly thoughtful in spots. Liked it more than I anticipated. The rare memoir that is really worth the time. ( )

A mixed bag from an author's first foray in writing books. The author looks at his time in a Korean deli, purchased for his mother in law. The book takes place over a period of years, looking at the day to day issues of running a store, the more interesting activities that happen and the customers that pass through. Not ever spending much time in NY, this was rather fascinating.

However, the book is rather uneven, talking about the deli as well as the lives of some of the people in it as well as the author's personal life and other job. Sometimes it flowed really well and was very interesting to read, and sometimes I found myself skipping over passages, because I did not buy this book to read about the author's job at the magazine, but rather what he does at the deli.

There does seem to be good social commentary as well. The author discusses how hard it can be to keep customers happy when they've been used to seeing the same prices and same employees (and will flip if they fire such employee...). That NY can make it VERY difficult to run a business with fees, enforcement and stings that sometimes are for legal purposes, and some that just seem totally wacky. The various type of people, from employees to customers will probably bring a smile or shudder of horror to anyone who has ever done customer service in retail, and the author points out it is something everyone should do.

The book mostly fails when it tries to describe the life of a few people and their relationships to the author. One I grew to care less and less about and the other it was difficult to care as the book went on. I felt there was some attempt to parallel the author's time at the store and his other job to the times of these people, but it didn't quite tie in. Really, while the book initially started off very well, at times the book feels very much like a mishmash of stories that don't quite tie well enough together.

Probably an interest if you have a daily deli you go to, live in NY or have experience with immigrant families and their stores. ( )

Really, a three and a half star book but why quibble. It's funny and just deep enough to keep you thinking. Very very enjoyable. ( )