The Inspiration Behind Recipe for Joy

This book was born from grief…but, also, from deep love.

For years, I drove from New York to Cleveland to take care of my mom, going with her to treatments, cooking for her, doing whatever I could to make the battle she was fighting easier. But what my husband, John, did for us in January of 2021, still takes my breath away. He moved us and our beloved shih tzu, Kona, to Gates Mills, Ohio, so I could be close to my mom.

The time we got together was precious beyond measure. She loved our home in Gates Mills—we all did. We’d putter in the yard together, then relax on the patio side-by-side. We grew seedlings in the laundry room under grow lights, then planted them outside where they soaked up the sun.

After her treatments, my mom always wanted to come to our house. We watched baseball together, watched birds together, even fed the squirrels from this silly squirrel feeder that held dried corn cobs. She took long naps on her favorite couch with Kona curled up beside her. And at the end of her life, my sister and I were blessed to be with her every moment…our beloved mom was surrounded by love and candlelight as we walked her home.

No one is ever prepared for the loss of their mother, and I certainly wasn’t, despite caring of her for as long as I did. In the weeks and months after her passing, I was a shell of myself. I couldn’t listen to music or read contemporary fiction. I didn’t respond to emails, to calls, to invites. It was like I didn’t know how to be a person anymore. Everything was too much—it all evoked emotions that were too big, too sharp.

“One of the first things I tried to do was bake her favorite snickerdoodle cookies. They came out awful, dry and tasteless. I thought of them as grief cookies. Threw them all away.”

One of my dearest friends would come to keep me company while I…wasn’t much company at all. One of the first things I tried to do was bake her favorite snickerdoodle cookies. They came out awful, dry and tasteless. I thought of them as grief cookies. Threw them all away.

Writing is what I do, but I couldn’t even manage that. For whatever reason, opening my laptop and typing on a word document was impossible. So, after some months, I started writing longhand. It was emotional. I poured out everything that was rising up, and, at the same time, started to noodle on a story. I’ve always known stories. And in this period of my life where it felt like I didn’t know anything at all, a life-preserver of a thought bobbed up…try a story.

And so, with Kona by my side, I wrote longhand day after day, page after page. It got me over the hump and after I filled a notebook, I transitioned to my computer. Heartbreakingly, we had to say goodbye to our beloved Kona the following year. Then we had to bid farewell to our Gates Mills home and return to New York permanently. The story I started in Gates Mills with Kona by my side, I finished in New York with our new shih tzu baby, Poirot, next to me.

“Recipe for Joy is a book that was born during the after. As those who have lost loved ones know all too well, the after is a murky time when footing is hard to come by.”

Recipe for Joy is a book that was born during the after. As those who have lost loved ones know all too well, the after is a murky time when footing is hard to come by. What I wanted to convey with Recipe for Joy is that the after only happens when you’ve been lucky enough to love deeply. I also wanted to show how this tricky time can hold unexpected gifts and transformation.

Told in six parts, Recipe for Joy is an upmarket novel about belonging, coming of age when you’re middle-aged, and how a family’s cracks become chasms all too easily. It speaks to the gifts bestowed during life’s most challenging times, and how flavors passed down through generations hold the sweet promise of reconnection—no matter how much time has passed. Most of all, and I think this is important whenever talking about deep sorrow, the story shows how hope and happiness are there for anyone who reaches for them.

I’ll be honest: This book is a love letter. It’s a love letter to the quaint town we moved to, the time we had, and to my beloved mother, whose indefatigable spirit is threaded throughout many of the characters. The spirit of my grandmother—the original cook in our family—is in there too, as is the essence of my plucky great aunt. My sister, my first and best friend to this day, inspired me. So did my husband, who gave me the greatest gift ever, the precious gift of time.

I’m a storyteller who’s lived in small-town Ohio as well as big-city New York and have walked a road of grief between the two—a road that, surprisingly, I found to be paved with gifts. I wanted to write a book that would hold big emotions, the ones that are most difficult, as well as the ones that are staggeringly beautiful. I wanted the story to be relatable. Mostly, I wanted it to offer up hope…because if there’s one thing we can always use more of, it’s hope.

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Monica Comas was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. She holds a bachelor’s degree in English from The Ohio State University and a master’s in journalism from New York University. She’s worked as a newspaper reporter, a journalist covering stocks and the economy, and a financial editor. But fiction has always been her true love. Monica lives in New York with her husband, John, and their tiny shih tzu, Poirot.

Find out more about Monica on her website https://monicacomas.com/

Recipe for Joy

A grieving woman finds healing and purpose through her late grandmother’s cherished recipes in a poignant and hopeful novel about rediscovering the comfort of family in the most trying of times.

Belle Sutton is a little lost these days.

She has a stalled career, a New York apartment she can’t afford, and her sister, Lexie, is more estranged with each passing year. Belle’s one true consolation is her beloved grandmother, who’s powered through her own broken family ties with a tenacious zest for life and a passion for cooking. But when her grandmother suddenly passes away, a grieving Belle feels her only connection to the past is gone forever.

That’s when Belle receives a series of letters, along with a cookbook, photographs of Belle and Lexie when they were young and happy, and her grandmother’s last wish that the sisters mend severed ties before it’s too late. For the love of Gran, a challenge is met that sets Belle and Lexie on a journey of hope, reconciliation, surprising discoveries, and the nourishing power of family, forgiveness, and tradition. All they have to do is follow the directions.

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Tags: featured, women writers

Category: On Writing