Lisa Shea
Davidson has created an admirable, appealing heroine, a kind of female Odysseus who must survive the dangers and beauties of a foreign place that happens to be her ancestral homeland.
— The New York Times Book Review
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
Imam baildi, a Greek dish whose name translates to "the priest fainted," is a delicacy both bitter and sweetlike this meditative debut from poet Davidson (Inheriting the Ocean) about a young Greek-American woman's journey to her ancestors' homeland. Framed by Greek myths (which open each chapter) and interwoven with tales of her mother's visit 30 years earlier, the story concerns the odyssey of an unnamed, 19-year-old narrator who travels to Athens and the small town of Larissa, unwittingly following in the footsteps of the mother she is trying, for the moment, to escape. Her own lively expatriate experienceswhich include an obsession with a promiscuous Greek basketball player, a friendship with an impetuous American model, an Athenian newspaper job and a firsthand understanding of the conservative ethos surrounding Greek womenshow the difficulty of being at once of a culture and foreign to it. As she slowly discovers more about her mother's life-altering decision not to marry a Greek man, she realizes that not all family resemblances are on the surface. Davidson's reworking of the myths sometimes feels familiar (yet another unremarkable interpretation of the Orpheus and Eurydice story) and she has a tendency to poeticize that detracts from the narrative's authentic charge. Nevertheless, her voice is agile and intelligent, and the novel ultimately proves to be a surprisingly resonant mlange of wisdom and humor, a testimony to the strong bonds of family and cultural traditions.
Library Journal
Award-winning poet Davidson's first novel reads like a literary quilt. Each chapter is filled with beautiful stories, but until the very end one cannot help but wonder howor even ifthe many intricate pieces that make up each section will come together. Suffice it to say, they do. Poetic present-tense narratives meld with ancient allegories as two generations of Greek American women, a mother and a daughter, examine their cultural heritage and the emotional baggage that comes with it. Nonlinear and highly ardent, the novel explores family bonds by looking at how messages about gender, sexuality, family, and community are passed on generation to generation, woman to woman. Dozens of other themes are also addressed, among them American racism, old- and new-world sexism, the lure of assimilation, and the power of foodincluding a bread called imam baildi ("the priest fainted"). All are woven into the mix with amazing elegance, marking Davidson as a master wordsmith and stunning storyteller.
— Eleanor J. Bader, New School for Social Research, New York, N.Y.
