Only in Spain
A Foot-Stomping, Firecracker of a Memoir about Food, Flamenco, and Falling in Love
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- $20.99
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- $20.99
Publisher Description
Why don’t you...run away and start over?
Ten-hour shifts in a high-end department store and catering to snooty customers...Nellie Bennett's life wasn't supposed to turn out this way. But maybe all she needs to do is infuse a little passion into her routine—through flamenco dance lessons, for instance.
What Nellie doesn't realize is that flamenco is not just a dance—it's a way of life that seems much more enticing than her depressing retail gig. So she packs her suede dance shoes and leaves everything she knows behind, flying halfway around the world to seek the authentic experience in Seville, where the dark-eyed boys and mouth-watering tapas are enough to make Nellie want to stay in Spain forever. And why shouldn't she?
Only in Spain is a foot-stomping, full-on firecracker of a memoir—crackling with energy, food, dance, passion, and love—that will capture your heart with the first "Olé!"
"A vivid, entertaining memoir...Bennett had me itching to pack my bag and join her."—Ann Vanderhoof, author of An Embarrassment of Mangoes and The Spice Necklace
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Bennett's transformational adventure parlays into a fun, sparkling memoir. As an unmarried young 20-something toiling as a shopgirl in a Sydney department store, the plucky protagonist feels directionless, but when she spots an advertisement for a flamenco school she signs up, and the class ignites a passion for the dance and Spanish culture: "After years of feeling lost, I suddenly knew what it was that I wanted out of life." Soon her journey into the flamenco world leads the anxious vegan ("some people thrive under pressure, but not me") to Seville to immerse herself as deeply in the art as she can, all while savoring (meaty) tapas and deep-fried churros, and dancing all night. She falls for her flamenco teacher and in love with Seville. The book is most compelling when Bennett returns to Spain to live in Madrid and study at the apex of flamenco schools, Amor de Dios. While teaching English and trying to live on cheap gazpacho, she develops a fascination with Gypsies even dating a Gypsy boy, which lands her in some trouble in a Gypsy ghetto, alone and "married" according to Gypsy law.
