My Korean Deli: Risking It All for a Convenience Store

My Korean Deli by Ben Ryder Howe




There are books I read that make me wish I were as good at reviewing books as I am at reading them. This book is one of these.




Howe is the WASP-iest of WASPs, with Pilgrim ancestors who came over on the first boats, and an A+ education. He's an editor at the Paris Review which, to the five of us who continue to salute the written word, is up there with the Supreme Ruler of the Western World. He's married to a woman who is a new immigrant, with that killer drive which leaves the rest of us watching her zip by as we watch by the edge of the highway, dazzled and dazed.




The story is really the story of America today told with both humor and sadness, an America sitting proudly on its crumbling throne, an America where new immigrants vigorously race around to throw together businesses that fail nevertheless, where intelligence doesn't work, where energy doesn't work, where nothing works, where everyone is left sad and bewildered. All in a humorous way.