Bite by Bite
Aimee Nezhukumatathil, a poet and the author of World of Wonders, turns to food in these forty short essays. Each one takes a single item, mango, shave ice, lumpia, vanilla, rambutan, and follows the threads of memory and feeling attached to it, from childhood and family to grief, desire, and belonging. The pieces are brief and lyrical, more like prose poems than recipes, and they map a life through what she has eaten and shared. Fumi Nakamura's illustrations run through the book. Nezhukumatathil writes about heritage and remembrance with warmth, making the small act of eating a way into who we are.
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What you might want to know about Bite by Bite
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
A poet's collection of short essays, each centered on a food and the memory, longing, or joy it carries.
Yes. Roxane Gay chose it as the June 2024 pick for The Audacious Book Club.
No. It is a collection of personal essays about food and memory, not a book of recipes.
Bite by Bite was written by Aimee Nezhukumatathil, published in 2024 by Ecco.
Bite by Bite is 224 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Bite by Bite takes most readers 3 to 5 hours to finish.
Bite by Bite is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.