Short stories about Ethiopian immigrants in the US that examine identity and belonging.
These stories explore people trying to find a 'home' and have a safe space for themselves. The Suitcase is about a woman who has lived between two cultures, visiting Addis Ababa for the first time.
Mekonnen aka Mack aka Huey Freakin Newton shows the importance Americans place on the color of one's skin and how the diaspora struggle to fit in. I enjoyed the titular story A down home meal for these difficult times the most. Here, food becomes a love language and through food immigrants try to settle in their home.

Debut author Hadero won the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing for this work in progress, many of whose stories had been published in periodicals in 2015–20. The 15 stories are roughly half in the first person and half in the third person, and apart from a couple whose place or character origins aren’t specified, I think all are about Ethiopians or Ethiopian Americans. Often, the protagonist is a recent immigrant. Yohannes, in “Medallion,” is recruited by his taxi driver almost immediately upon his arrival in Los Angeles, but finds that his American dream never comes through. In “The Thief’s Tale,” an old Ethiopian man who speaks no English is lost in Prospect Park. When the man who holds him up at knifepoint realizes there is no watch or wallet to take, he lets him call his daughter from a payphone and, as they wait, the two strangers share their stories of failure and regret.

Sometimes Ethiopia is the setting instead. “The Suitcase” has Saba getting ready to return to the USA after a one-month visit to Addis Ababa, her bag 10 kilograms too heavy because of everything people are sending back with her. In “The Street Sweep,” Getu hopes to impress a departing NGO worker enough at his leaving party at the Addis Sheraton that he’ll get a life-changing job offer. This one was a standout, though distressing for how it rests on misunderstanding.

My favorites seem like they could be autobiographical for the author. “The Wall” is narrated by a man who immigrated to Iowa via Berlin at age 10 in the mid-1980s. At a potluck dinner, he met Professor Johannes Weill, who gave him free English lessons. Six years later, he heard of the Berlin Wall coming down and, though he’d lost touch with the professor, made a point of sending a note. The connection across age, race and country is touching. “Sinkholes” is a short, piercing one about the single Black student in a class refusing to be the one to write the N-word on the board during a lesson on Invisible Man. The teacher is trying to make a point about not giving a word power, but it’s clear that it does have significance whether uttered or not. “Swearing In, January 20, 2009” is a poignant flash story about an immigrant’s patriotic delight in Barack Obama’s inauguration, despite prejudice encountered.

The title story is the only foodie link, but it’s a sweet one. Two women who attend church Amharic classes in New York City admit that they can’t cook, but want to impress at the PTA bake sale, so go in search of a quintessential American cookbook, and in the years to come prepare dishes from The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook every time there is a crisis. “When Yeshi’s husband left her for a blonde waitress, they made Broiled Hamburg Steak, just the once. … When Jazarah’s credit cards were stolen and maxed out, they made trays of Corn Fritters.” Eventually, they start to make a living from their own food truck.

There were no bad stories here per se, but several too many, and not enough variety. I also didn’t warm to the couple of political satires involving manuscripts. “The Case of the Missing _______,” set in 2036 and counting backwards from Day 100, is a document full of erasure, produced by the Minnesota newspaper The Exile Gazeta and concerning an absent authoritarian leader. It made me think of Ella Minnow Pea, or perhaps novels by Jonathan Safran Foer and Hernan Diaz, and felt different to the rest, but not in a good way. It would be interesting to try a novel by Hadero someday.

A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times by Meron Hadero is a beautifully written collection of short stories that explores the lives and experiences of Ethiopians and Ethiopian-Americans living both in their home country and in the United States. The stories are rich and complex, with characters who are deeply human and relatable.

One of the strengths of this collection is the way it seamlessly weaves together the personal and the political. Hadero explores issues such as immigration, race, and identity with sensitivity and nuance, while also delving into the universal experiences of love, loss, and family.

One of the standout stories in the collection is "The Wall," which tells the story of a young Ethiopian woman who is seeking asylum in the United States. The story is both heart-wrenching and hopeful, and it shines a light on the difficulties faced by immigrants as they navigate a new and unfamiliar country.

This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and I would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times by Meron Hadero is a collection of short stories that explore the themes of identity, displacement, and belonging. The book is set in Ethiopia, Eritrea, and the United States, and it offers a nuanced and insightful look at the experiences of immigrants and refugees.

Hadero's writing is vivid and evocative, and she creates a powerful and moving portrait of the ways in which people strive to make sense of their lives and find their place in the world. The stories are filled with complex and deeply flawed characters, and Hadero does a fantastic job of exploring their motivations and relationships with great nuance and sensitivity.

What sets A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times apart from other collections of short stories is its exploration of the themes of home and belonging. The book offers a poignant and moving look at the ways in which people struggle to maintain their sense of identity and connection to their roots in the face of displacement and upheaval.

Overall, A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times is a beautifully crafted and deeply moving collection of stories that offers a compelling portrait of the human experience. It is a reminder of the importance of compassion, empathy, and understanding, and a testament to the resilience of the human spirit.

3.5 stars

This collection doesn't shy away from the harsh realities that immigrants face when navigating their new homes. The unbridled racism, unwarranted fear and overall harsh treatment. My personal favourites in the collection: Medallion, Mekonnen, Kind Stranger and A Down Home Meal. However, Sinkholes will be the story that sticks with me the most out of all of them.

These stories are not easy to stomach, but that doesn't make them any less beautiful.

If you’ve been struggling to reconnect with reading, short stories could be the solution: these bitesize slices of fiction present a chance to dip your toes, to stand in another’s life for a few short moments, before being whisked off to the next tale. This unforgettable collection is the first book from Ethiopian-American writer Meron Hadero and includes several of her award-winning shorts: including the winner of the 2021 AKO Caine Prize for African Writing, in which we’re introduced to a street sweeper in Addis Ababa who thinks he’s found a solution to the threat of losing his home and steps into another life for for an afternoon. Her confident stories segue from heartbreak to opportunity in mere sentences: these tiny, glowing vignettes sweep you up before handing you on to the next hero, and the larger themes begin to emerge from the disparate tales. All the characters are searching for home, whatever that means – whether immigrants, refugees or food truck vendors serving packed lunches to executives – and they share beautiful universal truths about race, equality, grief, serving up sentences that’ll see you reaching for your notebook or phone notes app to capture their intensity. Like the finest stories of whatever length, you are left wanting a second serving, but have to be content with what you’ve been given by this gifted author.

“Oh, what we all have been through to get here, what pains to leave our homes and start again, and we think that if we can just make it here, all will be well. Little do we realize that once we show up, that’s when the hardest work begins, life’s work. Leaving, crossing, arriving, pitching your home, that’s prelude. The struggle, the legging go, that long voyage, that’s all just prelude” (“Preludes”)

The first few stories in this collection by an Ethiopian American author were absolutely brilliant and had me recommending the book all over the place. “The Suitcase” takes a young women who has returned to Ethiopia on a visit with the requisite suitcase full of gifts for relatives and old friends, and then must take it back full of items for these people’s diasporic families – but what happens when the case is too full and too heavy? A chorus of marvellous voices tries to persuade Saba what to take and what to discard: what will she do? And “The Wall” was absolutely fascinating, looking at the lives of Ethiopian settlers in Germany, faced with the Berlin wall, and later in a third country, the protagonist meets an elderly German man and considers their two very different emigrations.

“The Street Sweep” looks at the fragile relationship between an American NGO worker who makes foolish promises and the Ethiopian street sweeper who believes them, but in a twist common to these stories, the street sweeper begins to grasp his own fate in his own hands, too. This one in particular taught me about the way life in at least Addis Ababa is arranged and regulated; other stories taught me more about the country’s history. “The Thief’s Tale” was a satisfying story of an old, visiting Ethiopian father, lost in New York, getting one up on a potential assailant; it had a ring of a folk story to it but was steeped in enough local detail to be a good read for me.

And in the title story, “A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times” we meet two women who did not have to cook or do housework back home but now get a standard American cookbook and work through the recipes as events occur in their lives, eventually running a very successful food truck and getting others through downturns and troubles. “Preludes” was a bit more experimental, but this set of linked short pieces about a neighbourhood was moving and gave a real sense of community, and it contains the quotation I give above (said by a woman of Caribbean origin in this story but echoing other stories in the book).

I didn’t love all the stories: those which I haven’t mentioned did feel a bit self-consciously literary or even writing-course-y, something I am immediately suspicious of, but all showed a solid talent and work done at the craft, I learned a lot about Ethiopian and diaspora Ethiopian life and I will undoubtedly look out for this author’s next production.

My blog review (out 12 Jan 23): https://librofulltime.wordpress.com/2023/01/12/book-review-meron-hadera-a-down-home-meal-for-these-difficult-times/

Hadero has created a gem of a collection of short stories, all tied with the central need to belong. At once a critique of contemporary racism in America and an expose of the nation's omnipresent 'dream'. A search for identity amongst the displaced is explored throughout these stories, from the reluctant cab driver, scammed by a 'friend' to the unlikely friendship forged between two German speakers.

A brightness shines through from these tales despite the challenges faced by the protagonists, illuminating that just a little humanity goes a long way.

I was drawn to this short story collection by its title, I intended to dip in and out of this collection over a week but once I began reading I found it hard to put down. These are stories of Ethiopian people, a couple set in Ethiopia but the majority are stories of Ethiopian immigrants in the US., The structure and writing style varies across the stories but similar themes run throughout - displacement, migration, class, loss, connection and hope. Each story was unique, one or two fell a little short of the mark for me and three in particular were outstanding reads for me: A Down Home Meal for The Difficult Times- the title story, a tale of two women who learn to cook American food after emigrating and turn to their shared cookbook of American food in times of difficulty . The Wall- An friendship between two immigrants living in Iowa and Swearing In, January 20th 2009,, one mans observations of Obama's inauguration.

Very much recommend this collection. The stories are informative , charming, uncomfortable, entertaining and heartbreaking. A breadth of experiences that offer a tiny glimpse into the world of the Ethiopian diaspora. I loved the variety within and look forward to reading more from Meron Hadero..

A moving collection of short stories based in the US and abroad from an Ethiopian-American author. These stories dealt with the themes of home, race, gender, class, and hope, to name a few.

I enjoyed some of the stories more than others. Most notable stories include; “The Suitcase”, a story showcasing the complexity of those born into two different cultures, and the seemingly small things that can piece us together. The Street Sweep”, a young man finds himself about to lose his home in Addis Ababa and tries to turn his life around, and “A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times” a story which highlights the need for home.

A collection of different stories exploring race - and there were some really good stories in there, in a collection like this some will stand out more than others, so whilst I didn't enjoy every single one, there was definitely more than enough to keep going through the book!

Some stories were brilliant, others, not so much. Overall, an interesting read. I would definitely read the next book the author writes.

I really enjoyed this. Each story was unique and touched on a different aspect of migration/homeland and offered a great insight into Ethiopia and the Ethiopian diaspora - thanks for the advance copy on NetGalley!

A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times is a collection of short stories by new author Meron Hadero. The stories are all quite unique, written in different styles and using different voices. However, there is a truth and authenticity about the stories that imply some autobiographical basis. The stories may not have happened to the author themselves, but I feel that aspects of the stories are true to some extent. There is a lot of carefully observed reality on the pages. I hope Meron Hadero has a novel on the way, I would very much like to read it.

This beautiful and educational collection of short stories focuses on the Ethiopian experience for those who stayed and those who left. Main themes: racism, corruption, injustice, rich vs. poor, hope vs. fear, migration, and belonging.

My favorites:
-The Wall (an unlikely friendship forms between a young Ethiopian immigrant and Herr Weill, a German professor who left Berlin after Kristallnacht when they meet at a potluck)
-The Street Sweep (an exploration of the relationship between a young Ethiopian boy and an American aid worker in Addis Ababa)
-A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times (an inspirational tale of two Ethiopian-American women who open a food truck and create a sense of community)

Thank you granting me the access to this book. I appreciated the privilege to experience Ethiopian immigration/diaspora experience but I think the writing style of the author just wasn't for me. I tried really hard to enjoy this but the language didn't move me.

Heart wrenching read.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and the publishers for letting me read this book in exchange for my review.

A Down Home Meal for These Difficult Times by Meron Hadero is a collection of stories exploring the Ethiopian immigrant experience.