Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by thebooknerdscorner
Eliza, from Scratch by Sophia Lee
4.0
When an academic obsessed girl ends up in a culinary arts class that she absolutely sucks at, she must turn to an unlikely ally in order to keep her GPA from crashing drastically.
Eliza Park is ready to have the perfect senior year with her two best friends and her superior grades. That is, until she learns that she is put into Culinary Arts instead of AP Chemistry. Finding herself stuck in a "regular" class, Eliza soon realizes that she is horrible at anything that involves a kitchen. Desperate to maintain her prestigious GPA, Eliza teams up with Wesley Ruengsomboom, the class's culinary expert. As Eliza learns to cook in order to pass the class, she also gleans more about her family than she ever could have imagined and discovers there is so much more to Wesley than meets the eye.
This one is such a sweet romance with so many great messages about discovering yourself, chasing your dreams, and the connections that bind families together. I often have a hard time connecting with cooking books, but Lee did such an amazing job at portraying what food means to the Park family that I found myself completely absorbed by this concept.
I relate a bit to Eliza's addiction to honors classes and getting good grades. By no means was I as intense as she is about academics as she is, but school was pretty much my entire life when I was in high school, too. There were many times that I felt Eliza was crossing a line with the lengths she was willing to do just to score good marks, but some of the quotes resonated with me so deeply that it brought tears to my eyes (especially when it talked about not feeling like she was good at anything besides school and her not knowing what to write about for the personal segment of her college application).
Wesley was such a great love interest. His passion for cooking is contagious and all his worries are so valid. I totally feel his fears when it comes to pursuing his love for cooking even though it's not the most sustainable career. I love really niche art forms, and I hope to make a career out of them too, so I found Wesley's narrative to be super applicable to my life. His love for Pixar movies is also super adorable, and I love the way that he shared his passion for them with Eliza while he helped her learn to cook.
This book starts with Eliza and Wesley as academic rivals (even though they are in quite different leagues), but the two grow pretty close rather quickly. The banter between these two is comical and witty; I always enjoyed listening to these two go back and forth while in the kitchen. The fact that Wesley helps Eliza with her culinary skills and Eliza helps Wesley with his math is also super cute. I must admit that the third act conflict between these two was slightly frustrating, but sadly very realistic. They got through it quick enough though, so I wasn't too bothered by it.
The way that Eliza learns to connect with her mother through her grandmother's recipes is such a touching part of this story. Eliza has grown up in a pretty traditional Korean household with her mother speaking Korean and making classic cuisine, but that doesn't mean that Eliza always feels like she belongs. She barely feels any connection to her deceased grandmother, and I absolutely adore the way that cooking with her mother allowed Eliza to learn more about her mother's childhood as well as form a deeper connection with her grandmother that she never got the chance to bond with herself.
Overall, "Eliza, from Scratch" is a very sweet rom com featuring one school obsessed girl who learns to widen her worldview through culinary arts. I relate immensely to both Eliza and Wesley, which made this a bit of an emotional read. The academic setting is great, the themes are powerful, and the characters are riddled with realistic issues. This is a strong debut, and I look forward to seeing what else Lee pens in the future!
Eliza Park is ready to have the perfect senior year with her two best friends and her superior grades. That is, until she learns that she is put into Culinary Arts instead of AP Chemistry. Finding herself stuck in a "regular" class, Eliza soon realizes that she is horrible at anything that involves a kitchen. Desperate to maintain her prestigious GPA, Eliza teams up with Wesley Ruengsomboom, the class's culinary expert. As Eliza learns to cook in order to pass the class, she also gleans more about her family than she ever could have imagined and discovers there is so much more to Wesley than meets the eye.
This one is such a sweet romance with so many great messages about discovering yourself, chasing your dreams, and the connections that bind families together. I often have a hard time connecting with cooking books, but Lee did such an amazing job at portraying what food means to the Park family that I found myself completely absorbed by this concept.
I relate a bit to Eliza's addiction to honors classes and getting good grades. By no means was I as intense as she is about academics as she is, but school was pretty much my entire life when I was in high school, too. There were many times that I felt Eliza was crossing a line with the lengths she was willing to do just to score good marks, but some of the quotes resonated with me so deeply that it brought tears to my eyes (especially when it talked about not feeling like she was good at anything besides school and her not knowing what to write about for the personal segment of her college application).
Wesley was such a great love interest. His passion for cooking is contagious and all his worries are so valid. I totally feel his fears when it comes to pursuing his love for cooking even though it's not the most sustainable career. I love really niche art forms, and I hope to make a career out of them too, so I found Wesley's narrative to be super applicable to my life. His love for Pixar movies is also super adorable, and I love the way that he shared his passion for them with Eliza while he helped her learn to cook.
This book starts with Eliza and Wesley as academic rivals (even though they are in quite different leagues), but the two grow pretty close rather quickly. The banter between these two is comical and witty; I always enjoyed listening to these two go back and forth while in the kitchen. The fact that Wesley helps Eliza with her culinary skills and Eliza helps Wesley with his math is also super cute. I must admit that the third act conflict between these two was slightly frustrating, but sadly very realistic. They got through it quick enough though, so I wasn't too bothered by it.
The way that Eliza learns to connect with her mother through her grandmother's recipes is such a touching part of this story. Eliza has grown up in a pretty traditional Korean household with her mother speaking Korean and making classic cuisine, but that doesn't mean that Eliza always feels like she belongs. She barely feels any connection to her deceased grandmother, and I absolutely adore the way that cooking with her mother allowed Eliza to learn more about her mother's childhood as well as form a deeper connection with her grandmother that she never got the chance to bond with herself.
Overall, "Eliza, from Scratch" is a very sweet rom com featuring one school obsessed girl who learns to widen her worldview through culinary arts. I relate immensely to both Eliza and Wesley, which made this a bit of an emotional read. The academic setting is great, the themes are powerful, and the characters are riddled with realistic issues. This is a strong debut, and I look forward to seeing what else Lee pens in the future!