Lawyers love Jane Austen, disproportionately—often rabidly—so. A leading London jurist once memorably quipped of his devotion: “I read all six of Austen’s books every year, because if I didn’t, I would simply read Emma over and over.”
Young children playing on a beach today will live through perhaps the most consequential time for the human species in the past 10,000 years. They will grow up to see how this story ends, to see how our choices play out. If we use our great discoveries, apply our unique minds and direct our unparalleled communication and problem-solving skills to restoring our ocean, then those children will bring their own into a world where the biggest challenges our species has ever faced have already been navigated.
They will witness decades of recovery and restoration. They will see shoals of fish, roosts of seabirds and pods of whales beyond anything anyone alive has ever laid eyes upon. They will experience the rebirth of coastal communities and the turning point in the stabilisation of our climate. But more than that, they will live in a world where our species, the most intelligent to exist on Earth, has moved beyond trying to rule the waves and instead has learnt to thrive alongside the greatest wilderness of all.
A stunning bluefin tuna sat atop a pedestal. Its glassy eyes glistened in the natural light from the windows. I knew the tuna wasn’t alive — but boy, did it look like it was about to wink.
I went to my first tuna cutting at O by Brush, the one-Michelin-starred omakase option at Brush Sushi in Buckhead. As a handful of us took our seats around the fresh fish brought in from Mexico, chef Jason Liang picked up one of several knives (he also has a saw) and began slicing, hacking, and scraping. Off with the head, and then came the segments of fatty back (sekam), back cheek (kama-toro), collar bone, and that prized extra-fatty otoro belly.
It’s a compelling novel that fills one with an actual physical sense of dread, from the first words on the first page, and yet also offers glimpses of whimsy, beauty, and love. Florence Knapp’s debut novel, “The Names,” achieves this balance, highlighting the warmth and wonder of human existence, while weaving a tale of tragedies, ordinary and extraordinary, that befall its characters.
Sometimes sonic, sometimes meandering, sometimes all imagery, this collection pulls from all manner of structures and art forms to create a collage of language, cohesive and intentional, that meditates on this moment.
In Foreign Fruit, Goh turns oranges into a cipher, a way of writing about herself indirectly through a refracted lens that explodes the clean narratives she once reduced herself to. Each chapter braids together citrus's historical path across the globe with Goh's personal travels, family history, and meditations on hybridity.
Nearly five decades and 19 restaurants later, McNally’s Balthazar in SoHo, Minetta Tavern in New York and D.C., and other restaurants are still going strong. In his candid, funny and poignant memoir, “I Regret Almost Everything,” McNally, 73, shows that he is, too.