Metz's Perfection chronicles with lapidary precision one woman's climb back to happiness after not just a spouse's death, but also the shocking recognition that her life before that death was not what she had thought it was. The journey is a painful one, but Ms. Metz is much the stronger for having survived to recount it.

Cooking saved my life! Sure, there were some miserable moments, but that was sort of the point, to find something challenging and consuming enough to take a place in the center of my life into which was creeping a horrible feeling of stasis and the doom of mediocrity.

Two years ago, I was a twenty-nine year old secretary. Now I am a thirty-one year old writer. I get paid very well to sit around in my pajamas and type on my ridiculously fancy iMac, unless I'd rather take a nap. Feel free to hate me -- I certainly would.

It's sad, but a relief as well, to know that two things so closely bound together can separate with so little violence.

Maybe I needed to make like a potato, winnow myself down, be part of something that was not easy, just simple.

But hard bitten cynicism leaves one feeling peevish, and too much of it can do lasting damage to your heart.

There are times with your friends when you just have to put their whole mess out of your mind for a while.