Excerpt from We Must Not Think of Ourselves by Lauren Grodstein, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"How did you learn to cook, Pani Lescovec?" It was a question I liked to ask the women—it got them talking.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, how did you learn to cook?"

She turned, gave me a look like I was crazy. She had a worn, bleachedout face—thin eyebrows, soft, splotchy cheeks. Pale-green eyes, like cloudy water. "I didn't learn to cook. I just started cooking."

"How old were you?"

"Old enough to reach the stove."

"Which means?"

She sighed heavily. "I don't know, maybe five? Six? I made challah. I made soup. What everyone did."

"Would you mind telling me more?" I asked. "While the feet boil?"

"I'm going to fry gribenes out of these," she said. "And make chicken soup from the bones. As soon as my boy comes back with the onion."

"That's okay," I said. "We can talk while you cook."

She turned and looked at me curiously with her pale, worn-out face. "I don't know why you'd want to talk to me," she said. "I don't have much to say that's worth talking about. I'm not educated like you."

"You don't have to be educated to talk to me," I said. "You just have to talk."

"About what?" she said.

"Just ... anything. Your life before this. Your life here."

Pani Lescovec blushed, her splotchy cheeks growing rosy. "Nobody ever asks me about my life," she said.

I took out my white notebook. "Let me be the first."

Excerpted from We Must Not Think of Ourselves by Lauren Grodstein. Copyright © 2023 by Lauren Grodstein. Excerpted by permission of Algonquin Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.