I received this as a goodreads giveaway.The first five or six chapters are pretty meh, I paused after that for about four months before picking it up again. But I'm glad I did! It goes a lot of unexpected places, although I would have loved if the character of the Critic was more prominent, he was the most interesting one. I also like how most of the characters have titles ('the Sous-Chef', 'the Professor of Sauces') instead of names. It's not a long book, so it can't hurt to read. I wasn't for it at first, but I was pleasantly surprised by where it went! As an 'aspirational chef', it was enjoyable.