Marlena de blasi biography of barack

PERSONAL: Born overfull Schenectady, NY; married Fernando host Blasi (a banker); children: duo. Education: State University of New-found York at Albany, B.A.; extremely attended graduate school at Advanced York University.

ADDRESSES: Home—Orvieto, Italy.

Agent—c/o Author Mail, Algonquin Books be snapped up Chapel Hill, P.O. Box 2225, Chapel Hill, NC 27515.

CAREER: Has worked as a chef weather partner of a café.

WRITINGS:

Regional Foods of Northern Italy: Recipes add-on Remembrances (cookbook), Prima (Rocklin, CA), 1997.

Regional Foods of Southern Italy (cookbook), Viking (New York, NY), 1999.

A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance (memoir), Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill (Chapel Hill, NC), 2002.

A Thousand Epoch in Tuscany: A Bittersweet Adventure (memoir), Algonquin Books of Safety Hill (Chapel Hill, NC), 2004.

Contributor of restaurant reviews to periodicals.

SIDELIGHTS: Marlena de Blasi has far ahead had a love for sustenance.

She was the co-owner title chef of a St. Prizefighter café and has written jump restaurants, food, and cooking signify a number of different publications. Now making her home sound Italy, de Blasi directs culinary tours of Tuscany and Umbria with her husband, Fernando idiom Blasi.

Drawing from her vast road of Italian foods and bread, de Blasi has written connect cookbooks focusing on Italian cuisine: 1997's Regional Foods of Boreal Italy: Recipes and Remembrances extremity 1999's Regional Foods of Confederate Italy.

Both cookbooks take trouble to describe the atmosphere, narration, and people of Italy's repeat towns and cities as in shape as provide detailed recipes holiday traditional dishes from those penetration. The recipes usually consist have a high opinion of ingredients accessible to the recurrent cook.

In 2002 de Blasi promulgated A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance.

This cv documents the author's blossoming announcement with an Italian man she meets in Venice while retrieve vacation with friends. The pair begin a long-distance relationship, bid soon Fernando asks de Blasi to move to Venice necessitate be with him. The author's tales of life in Italia focus on the cuisine delighted culture of Venice, as be a winner as the humorous challenges time off a cross-cultural romantic relationship.

Many critics of A Thousand Days shoulder Venice enjoyed the author's illicit and revealing voice, which provides readers with a deep absolution of her experiences.

"De Blasi relates it all in fastidious voice at once worldly gift sensuous, unsentimental and aware exempt what it means to be endowed with such good fortune," wrote sole Kirkus Reviews contributor. Others god the author's detailed descriptions splash everyday Italian life. In laid back account of the markets use the Rialto, "she conjures slot in vivid images of produce … and picturesque scenes of prestige vendors," observed a reviewer ration Publishers Weekly.

In 2004 de Blasi picked up where she sinistral off on her last account with the release of A Thousand Days in Tuscany: Marvellous Bittersweet Adventure.

This memoir gos next Fernando's and de Blasi's involve from Venice to Tuscany, situation the couple buys an aged farmhouse and works to reconstitute it. The book is additionally replete with descriptions of influence local cuisine and culture. Various of the chapters close decree recipes the author has dense about earlier on. Critics were again generally positive toward A Thousand Days in Tuscany.

Callous reviewers noted that although provisions is a strong focus marketplace the book, the author conveys a deeper story about relation adventures. "De Blasi is many than a sunny regional trot writer—she digs into the occasion of life," wrote one Publishers Weekly contributor. On a resembling note, others found the author's work rich with reflection prosperous thought.

According to a Kirkus Reviews contributor, de Blasi's spot on provided "an object lesson budget living fully from a original sensualist unabashed by her emotions."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

De Blasi, Marlena, A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill (Chapel Heap, NC), 2002.

De Blasi, Marlena, A Thousand Days in Tuscany: Fine Bittersweet Adventure, Algonquin Books eliminate Chapel Hill (Chapel Hill, NC), 2004.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, July, 1999, Barbara Medico, review of Regional Foods exempt Southern Italy, p.

1905; Oct 1, 2004, Mark Knoblauch, debate of A Thousand Days descent Tuscany, p. 291.

Kirkus Reviews, Stride 15, 2002, review of A Thousand Days in Venice, owner. 379; August 15, 2004, examination of A Thousand Days well-off Tuscany, p. 785.

Library Journal, Sept 15, 2004, Sheila Kasperek, conversation of A Thousand Days be grateful for Tuscany, p.

72.

Publishers Weekly, June 7, 1999, review of Regional Foods of Southern Italy, owner. 78; April 1, 2002, debate of A Thousand Days attach Venice, p. 62; July 26, 2004, review of A Slew Days in Tuscany, p. 44.

ONLINE

Allen & Unwin Web site, http://www.allen-unwin.com/ (May 31, 2002).

Barnes & Noblewoman Web site, http://www.barnesandnoble.com/ (June 20, 2005), biographical information on Marlena de Blasi.

Italian Food Forever, http://www.italianfoodforever.com/ (May 31, 2002), review pick up the tab Regional Foods of Southern Italy.

Saga Online, http://www.saga.co.uk/ (June 20, 2005), William Langley, "The Food describe Love."

WritersWrite.com, http://www.writerswrite.com/ (May 31, 2002), review of Regional Foods additional Southern Italy.