Blooker Prize: Julie & Julia

By JULIETTE ROSSANT The first-ever Blooker Prize, sponsored by Lulu, was awarded to Julie Powell, who first blogged on Salon.com and then wrote Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen (Little Brown 2005). This is the story (true life or a la Reality TV? you decide) of a 30-year-old secretary living in Queens, who cooked all 524 recipes in Julia Child's classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking all in one year. Said Corey Doctorow, one of the three judges, of the winning book: Julia & Julia does that amazing nonfiction trick of making you care about a subject through great storytelling, even if you don't care about the subject itself. Powell's heartfelt, funny, and occasionally obscene tell-all about her journey of self-discovery and cholesterol is by turns funny, shocking and delicious. Those who dismiss blogging as "mere" confessional writing and complaining about one's day job fail to appreciate just how engrossing those genres can be when handled by a talented writer like Julie Powell. The story of how blogging -- writing in public -- changed Powell's life is inspirational and memorable. Said fellow judge Paul Jones: A great blook isn't a website shoveled onto paper. Julie and Julia successfully makes the transition and grows as it goes, having learned from the blog readers. The deeply personal story here, the story of an obsession, leads us all to see what could be trivial and indulgent as a personal and as it turns out communal art, an art of transformation and of conquest (of egg dishes and of self-doubt). Now, that's a compliment to any blogger (or other author). And the big question for a Blooker Prize winner: where do you go from here? Video resources: VidLit Related news: Canadian Broadcast Corporation BBC New York Times International Herald Tribune (AP) Washington Post (Reuters) Hindustan Times Sydney Morning Herald Independent (New Zealand) Guardian USA Today Previous articles: [Cookbook Reviews - complete] Technorati Tags: superchefblog, Juliette Rossant, super chef, celebrities, chefs, food, restaurants, cooking, branding, cuisine, blogging, food blogging, cookbooks, blooker --> back to superchefblog