From the Book - First edition.
Cast of characters (in order of first appearance)
"I absolutely saw a talent in him": early life
"Super smart, super funny": the teenage years
"A lot of fun to be around": young adulthood
"It was what the cool kids were doing": the early New York years
"He just wanted to be a writer in the worst way": meeting Joel Rose
"They got some money, and it just went into their veins": heroin
"I'm Tony Motherfucking Bourdain
you got a problem?": New York in the nineties
"Such was my lust to see my name in print"
"Appalling stories of remorseless criminality": the Stone brothers
"You've got a long con going here": the genesis of 'Kitchen Confidential'
"It was picking up a rock off the restaurant scene and showing everything that was underneath it"
"He was not just a cook anymore; he was a real 3D person"
"I'm not gonna censor the guy": editing and publishing 'Kitchen Confidential'
"The brass ring comes around only once"
"He never came off book tour"
"I'd love to travel the world": 'A Cook's Tour' begins
"Tony was so reluctant to do television"
"He was ahead of his time": the end of 'A Cook's Tour'
"He was prepared to piss off everybody": Travel Chanel
"He was very untethered": the early 'No Reservations' years
"Basically he kidnapped my cat": Tony meets Ottavia
"Let's spin the wheel again": Beirut, a baby
"It was not the easiest thing": life on the road as a family
"Don't bother Tony": navigating friendships and fame
"We got shit done": making 'No Reservations'
"You see a person who's come full circle, and he's seen the world": 'Medium Raw'
"I knew I could write the story I needed to write": Tony as publisher, graphic novelist, and screenwriter
"I felt like I knew him all my life": David Simon recalls Tony
"He could have sat in Santa's throne in a shopping mall": the onstage experience
"He was a curator of people"
"He was a man of extremes"
"Darker, more transgressive, and more lurid": 'Roads & Kingdoms'
"Everyone felt they knew him": charisma and reserve
"Get a big fucking body bag": frustration and isolation in the field
"Tony had a burden of leadership that was real"
"He always had to perform the role of Tony"
"Such an unlikely program for him": 'The Taste'
"Push the boundary really hard, really fast": the move to CNN
"I really wasn't doing it for the cronut": Tony tries a talk show
"Middle-class white people going to poverty-stricken parts of the world...without being dicks about it"
"It was too much of a dream": the Bourdain market
"You don't direct Tony Bourdain": Life on the road with 'Parts Unknown'
"You were the guy that got arrested": Jason and Yeganeh Rezaian in Iran
"This is just another tribe": Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
"Maybe you'll find another chance at love": the end of the marriage
"Tony's changed; Tony's very different now"
"He was attracted to chaos"
"They're gonna tear you apart": Alienating friends
"He was like a young kid in love"
"Every good band eventually breaks up"
"Embracing the chaos": Rome and Puglia
" We bolstered each other's incorrect assertion that asking for help is somehow a mistake"
"Call it imposter syndrome, if you want, but Tony definitely had it"
"We should do something together": Kenya with W. Kamau Bell
"I knew 'Someone' was doomed": Hong Kong
"You can't put your arms around a memory": New York, Asturias, Florence
"It's hard to see things as they really are"
He was an extraordinary witness and voice for the world".
