The Bookworm: Life happens while you're busy

When you're sick and have to stay home from work, nothing feels better than a warm spot on the sofa, a blanket, comfort food and comfort TV.

Those old reruns make you laugh. They take you back to a time when you were in high school or going through teenage angst. They make you remember when your family was young, life was easier, and you weren't home sick on the sofa.

Some of those shows are so familiar, you can almost recite the scripts from memory. And at the end, that funny dog with the Frisbee still makes you smile.

How about smiling some more? Read "Sit, Ubu, Sit" by Gary David Goldberg, learn about that dog, the day the photo was snapped, and the guy who loved the woman who took the picture.

At a party in Brooklyn in 1969, Gary David Goldberg saw the woman he would fall in love with. She was gorgeous, with long hair and green eyes, sitting on the floor and playing a guitar. Suavely, he sidled up to her and murmured words that surely made her swoon: "Nice guitar."

Three years later, they were still together and backpacking through Europe with their Labrador retriever, Ubu. Diana was four months' pregnant then. Gary hadn't yet met her parents. They didn't yet have a home, a college degree, a career. Ten dollars was enough to get them through another day. Another $40 got them all home to the States, including Ubu.

Fast-forward another decade. Diana was in college. Goldberg was working as a writer for various TV-production companies. He worked with Tony Randall. He wrote for Bob Newhart. He was friends with Steven Spielberg. He had jobs with MTM (Mary Tyler Moore's company) and other assorted television-show-generators.

And then he got the call from Brandon Tartikoff. NBC was picking up "Family Ties," the show Goldberg created. He needed to hire writers. He had to get staffed. He needed to find a cast.

Michael J. Fox was sent in to read, but Goldberg said no. Repeatedly.

And therein lies the other half of this beautifully-written, sweetly comic, self-depreciating, delightful love story.

"Sit, Ubu, Sit" is a story of one man's adoration for his wife, his family, his work and the friends who gave him the opportunities to do what he wanted to do. It's about growing up with an extended family in the 1950s at a time when everyone in the neighborhood knew (and was related to) everyone else. It will bring back memories for anyone who lived through the 1960s and backpacked through Europe (or wanted to).

Written in a back-and-forth-through-the-years style, this book is also about appreciation and the kind of friendship where both parties look at one another in awe, not quite believing that they were lucky enough to meet. And yes, like every good sitcom, there's a funny, happy ending.


Sometime in the next few weeks, you're going to have one very important day that you want to be absolutely perfect.

Maybe it's a birthday party, a trip with friends or a special date. You've envisioned how it's going to be and you've planned everything almost down to the minute.

And everything that can go wrong, will.

In the new book "Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet" by Sherri L. Smith, the best-laid plans of rice and (chow) mein go drastically wrong in Ana Shen's house. And it's all her family's fault.

The day was supposed to be so perfect. Ana Mei Shen would give her salutatorian's speech and graduated from eighth grade. She would walk off the stage with Jamie Tabata, the cutest boy in the school. He would put his arms around Ana and ask her to the graduation dance. That night, when they slow-danced (but not too slow) he might actually kiss her.

Those plans literally exploded when the water main at the school broke, sending a geyser of water everywhere. The dance was cancelled and everything was ruined: Ana's dress, her graduation gown and her best-laid plans.

But that didn't stop Ana's best friend, Chelsea, from opening her big mouth. Knowing that Ana's family was planning a small dinner, Chelsea invited Jamie and his family to Ana's house that evening. That could be an even bigger disaster.

Whenever Ana's grandparents were all in the same room, it seemed that nobody could get along. Nei Nei, Ana's Chinese grandmother, was bossy. Ye Ye, Ana's grandfather, was always grumpy. Ana's mother's parents, Grandpa and Grandma White, were cool and grandma made the best soul food in the world, but she was always asking personal questions.

As Ana's party comes together and her Chinese-American grandparents compete with her African American grandparents for Who Gives the Best Graduation Gift, everything just gets more complicated. When Jamie shows up with the beautifully blonde Mandy Conrad, it just gets worse. Can Ana see that her "marvelously biracial, multicultural family" is more than just a multicultural mess?

Remember being a tweenager? That's someone who's firmly in between childhood and growing up, and it's a hard place to be. Author Sherri L. Smith obviously remembers what it's like, because her Ana Shen is a likeable, realistic girl in an impossible, realistic situation that tweens can definitely identify with.

I loved the way "Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet" unfolded — the entire story takes place in a short 12-hour span of time — and I was surprised to see that when I thought I knew what was going to happen (and I was prepared to roll my eyes), I was wrong. There are parts that made me laugh and parts that made me remember exactly what it's like to be caught up in family drama that you never asked to have.

If you've got a 10-to-14-year-old girl in your life — especially one who seems nonplussed by her unique family — pick up a copy for her. "Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet" is a tasty little book.

