Welcome to “At The Table With”, À La Carte’s new monthly interview series. I’m excited to use these quick 3-question interviews to introduce you all to some of my favorite writers, designers, thinkers, friends, and generally cool people. My first guest: Tembe Denton-Hurst!
It feels right that my introduction to Tembe came by way of a book list, though I can’t remember if it was something she shared on her Instagram or wrote for The Strategist, where she works as a beauty and culture writer (she curates wonderful lists of recs in both places.) She’s become my absolute favorite person to look to for book suggestions and reviews, so you can only imagine how fast I clicked “preorder” when she announced her debut novel, Homebodies, which comes out May 2nd. It was really, really fast.
Fun fact about Tembe that I love: she and her partner Connay Bratton started a small batch biscuit delivery service called Sundays Only in the pandemic and they look *AMAZING*. If you’re in New York, you are blessed with the opportunity to order these biscuits and I am deeply jealous.
I had 3 questions for Tembe:
Ali LaBelle: Imagine perfect happiness. What does it smell, taste, feel and sound like?
Tembe Denton-Hurst: It tastes like Sundays with good light. Like crisp, freshly washed sheets and the crook of my wife’s neck. It’s biscuits smeared with honey and crispy potatoes. It’s 75 degrees and there’s a slight breeze. All my clothes fit. It sounds like Tompkins Ave. in the beginning of summer. The first notes of “Before I Let You Go” by Maze and Frankie Beverly. It’s folded laundry and clean rooms and the sound of my best friend’s laugh on the phone.
AL: Give us a rec!
TDH: I’ve been listening to a lot of gospel lately. “You Brought The Sunshine” by The Clark Sisters is essential listening. It’s so funky and the singing is incredible.
AL: It’s a table for two and your dinner date can be anyone dead or alive. Who do you invite?
TDH: Toni Morrison. I screenshotted something she said about memory today: “Memory (the deliberate act of remembering) is a form of willed creation. It is not an effort to find out the way it really was—that is research. The point is to dwell on the way that it appeared and why it appeared in that particular way.”
The biggest thank you to Tembe for being my first-ever newsletter dinner date! Tembe’s debut novel Homebodies comes out May 2nd — order it here and follow her on Instagram for book reviews, biscuits, and really good fit pics here.
x
Ali
P.S. If you’re a free subscriber considering upgrading, you miiight want to do so before the end of the month — a *really* good giveaway is coming for paid subscribers! You didn’t hear it from me.