The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

Expressions

1. Let her stew for a bit.

stew:  [stju:] (n.)1. 炖的菜 a pot of stew

2. in a stew（about/ over sth）: confused or worried about a difficult situation you are in 坐立不安

（v.）1. 炖 stewed apples

2. to think or worry about sth

I've been stewing over the problem for a while.

Leave him to stew. 让他自个儿想想。

let sb stew (in their own juice): informal, to leave sb to suffer the unpleasant results of their own actions instead of helping them 

2. Until the housing search began, A.J. could count on one hand of number of times he had thought about Tamberlane with any sort of regret.

中文里说的“用一只手就数的过来”竟然在英文里也有相同的表述！好神奇有没有！

3. All of Abner's stories end with the same twist: that everything had been a dream.

twist:这里指 an unexpected feature or change in a situation or serious of events

an unexpected twist in the plot

By an amazing twist of fate, we met again in Madrid five years later.

4. Mama is a morbidly obese white woman.

morbid: [ˈmɔ:bɪd] （a.）1. 病的；2. 病态的 having or expressing a strong interest in sad or unpleasant things, especially disease or death

He had a morbid fascination with blood.

morbidity: (n.) [mɔ:'bɪdətɪ] 病态；发病率

Preterm birth（早产）and low birth weight ( lbw) are major determinants of infant morbidity and mortality.

5. Maya, having recently made her way through the Lord of the Rings trilogy, names it Bag End.

trilogy: [ˈtrɪlədʒi] (n.) (小说、戏剧、音乐等的） 三部曲

Laurie Lee's trilogy of autobiographical novels

Thought

这一章里长大后的Maya在一篇作文里以自己的亲生母亲为原型创造了一短篇小说并拿到了作文奖。人生中总有一些遗憾埋藏在心底，有些人选择去弥补，有些人选择压制和遗忘，也有人像Maya一样用另一种形式去变现填补那份心底无法挽回的遗憾。我个人觉得，选择正视自己的遗憾并且去做一点什么，不管能不能真正去填补，都比压抑在心底要好。因为即使你一直自欺欺人地告诉自己，那已经不重要了，但说不定某一天，某个夜深人静的夜晚，那份空虚感、惆怅感会扩张得让你觉得无法喘息。如果可以的话，去一次某个一直想去旅行的地方，或者见一次那些一直想见面但又不敢主动联系的人。即使你去了或做了以后发现，那个地方或者那个人并不是你想象中的样子，甚至感觉失望，但至少那份遗憾感不会再在今后的人生里反复地追逐着和吞噬着你。