From the Bookshelf of Goodreads Authors/Readers…

Body and Bread

Nan Cuba

Discussion: Literary Fiction

Why we're reading this: One of "Ten Titles to Pick Up Now" in O, Oprah's Magazine, and one of Huffington Post's "Summer Books"…more
[close] One of "Ten Titles to Pick Up Now" in O, Oprah's Magazine, and one of Huffington Post's "Summer Books"

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 469 topics — 4,646 comments total

Literary Fiction

* Welcome Literary Fiction Authors and Readers!!
By Vincent , Group Founder · 664 posts · 3214 views

last updated Oct 15, 2025 02:00AM

free book promotion on amazon
By Sibusiso · 2 posts · 8 views

last updated Oct 15, 2025 02:01AM

What Members Thought

Sep 06, 2013 David rated it it was amazing

Shelves: americanliterature

A TOP SHELF review, originally published in the October 24, 2013 edition of The Monitor

Earlier this year, independent press Engine Books released the first novel by editor, journalist and professor Nan Cuba. Twenty years in the making, Body and Bread has attracted considerable positive response, being featured on both O Magazine’s “Ten Titles to Pick Up Now” and Huffington Post’s “Summer Books: 15 New Releases to Put on Your Reading List.”

The story centers on Sarah Pelton: an unmarried, middle-a A TOP SHELF review, originally published in the October 24, 2013 edition of The Monitor

Earlier this year, independent press Engine Books released the first novel by editor, journalist and professor Nan Cuba. Twenty years in the making, Body and Bread has attracted considerable positive response, being featured on both O Magazine’s “Ten Titles to Pick Up Now” and Huffington Post’s “Summer Books: 15 New Releases to Put on Your Reading List.”

The story centers on Sarah Pelton: an unmarried, middle-aged anthropologist whose estrangement from her family is brought to a forcible end when the widow of her long-dead and much beloved brother Sam announces that her daughter will die unless she gets a very expensive surgery.

The family is drawn into ugly legal wrangling over wills and the sale of inherited property, and Sarah finds herself forced to confront the past and present in ways she has studiously avoided for close to two decades. As she turns the craft of her profession on her own life — sifting through layers to unearth the secrets, lies, moldy fragments of relationships — she discovers a path back to others, into the future, by letting go of guilt and learning to live with unanswerable questions.

Cuba expertly interweaves the story of Sarah’s childhood and adolescence in central Texas during the ’50s and ’60s with events in the novel’s present. As we slowly uncover the origins of Sarah’s withdrawn, esoteric existence, we also witness her reconnection to family. The pivot is Sam, an amazingly complex character whose refusal to conform to his family’s traditional notions of propriety and meaning inspire Sarah’s own life choices, including dedicating herself to the study of the Nahua tribes, collectively referred to as Aztecs.

The author makes startling use of Sarah’s obsession with Aztec philosophy and culture, which in the present often take the form of waking fugues in which the anthropologist is “transported” to ritual moments of Mesoamerican past. The importance of sacrifice for the Aztecs, the valued place death held in their dual concept of the universe — a balance of destruction and creation — become ideological lenses through which Sarah comes to grip with her loss.

Beautifully written, hauntingly true, expertly spanning multiple cultures, time periods and philosophies, Body and Bread is nothing short of a tour-de-force. Read it. You will be transported. You will be transformed. ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Group Home Bookshelf Discussions

Photos Videos

Send invite Members Polls