Short takes

“I didn’t question the world as I found it: our wide moat and gatehouse tower, the medieval chapel above the kitchen, the huge uninhabited rooms to the west and the parade of strangers that passed through them each year. . . . I didn’t question my brother’s seizures or the frightening and unpredictable swings of his mood from gentleness and warmth to opposition and violence - these too were just facts I grew up among, how things were.’’

Mostly, in this memoir, William Fiennes was delighted by the charity concerts in the great hall, the traveling players putting on Shakespeare in the gardens, the camera crews setting up lights to film actors in period costumes. Mostly, he was attentive to his brother Rich and his uncontrollable facial and bodily movements, curious to understand his peculiar habits and fierce attachments. Mostly, he felt protected by his kind parents. But the huge ancient house with its public and private domains was scary, Rich was large, strong, and often angry, and the loving, patient parents were not always aware and alert.

Rich, an epileptic whose seizures felled him with regularity as a child, eventually sustained permanent brain damage. He had cognitive and behavioral problems, lacked initiative, insight, flexibility, and self control. Sent away to several epilepsy centers, he returned for holidays, and for longer stays when he was expelled for violent behavior. William reports the scientific advances in the study of epilepsy from magical beliefs, to the discovery of neurons, to the use EEG scans.

But it is the record of his feelings for Rich from childhood through adolescence that is compelling. Those feelings are remarkable for the absence of fear, shame, anger, and jealousy, and the presence of delight, charm and wonderment at the strange beauty and terror of the world.

GOURMET RHAPSODY
By Muriel Barbery
Europa, 160 pp., $15

Unlike her last novel, “The Elegance of the Hedgehog,’’ which had an eccentric and palpably real central character and a hint of a plot, this book has an unpleasant and underdeveloped central character and no plot at all. A famous food critic has 48 hours to live. What he wishes for is to catch a flavor that has been teasing his taste buds, that he cannot recall, and that he believes will reveal an ultimate truth to him.

The search for this truth takes him back to childhood, to his grandmother who transformed the most banal substances - “Sea urchins, oysters, mussels, grilled shrimp, shellfish with mayonnaise, calamari in sauce, but also . . . daubes, blanquettes, paellas, and poultry - roasted, stewed or a la crème.’’ He is eloquent about virile, powerful meat and strange, cruel fish. He tantalizes with this description of “the resistance of the skin - slightly taut, just enough; the luscious yield of the tissues, their seed-filled liqueur oozing to the corners of one’s lips, this plump little globe unleashing a flood of nature inside us: a tomato, an adventure.’’ He is delighted by the memories of orange sorbet, grilled sardines, and Moroccan bread.

Children, wife, mistresses mean nothing to him. As he dies, his favorite nephew wonders, “What do you think? That if you find a lost flavor you will eradicate decades of misunderstanding and find yourself confronted with a truth that might redeem the aridity of your heart of stone?’’ A reader hardly cares if he will find the flavor, the truth, or the answer.

YOU WERE ALWAYS MOM'S FAVORITE!
Sisters in Conversation Throughout Their Lives
By Deborah Tannen
Random House, 256 pp., $ 26

Like her other books about relationships, “You Just Don’t Understand,’’ (about women and men) and “You’re Wearing That?,’’ (about mothers and daughters), this book about relationships among sisters is interesting. It is no surprise that sisters connect deeply and compete fiercely. Sisters are points of comparison and contrast. “A sister is you and not-you. Understanding who you are means figuring out who you are in relation to her.’’ Birth order and age create expectations that can be a privilege, a responsibility, or a burden.

Tannen is at her best analyzing conversation, and for women and girls “talk is the glue that holds a relationship together.’’ Closeness requires exchanging personal information. Keeping secrets, passing on others’ secrets, maintaining silence to avoid anger, failing to notice a slight, misinterpretation, and misunderstanding play crucial parts in women’s relationships. Most women will see parts of themselves in many of Tannen’s examples and anecdotes, but they won’t see much that will excite, surprise, or shock them.

Barbara Fisher is a freelance writer who lives in New York.