A life–affirming memoir about resilience and repair—and the healing power of our ancestor's music, stories, and recipes.
Samantha’s mother tongue is dying out. The daughter of Iraqi Jewish refugees, Samantha grew up surrounded by the noisy, vivid, hot sounds of Judeo–Iraqi Arabic. A language that’s now on the verge of extinction.
The realization that she won’t be able to tell her son he’s "living in the days of the aubergines" or "chopping onions on my heart" or reminding him to "always carry salt" opens the floodgates. The questions keep coming. How can she pass on this heritage without passing on the trauma of displacement? Will her son ever love mango pickle?
In her search for answers Samantha encounters demon bowls, the perils of kohl, and the unexpected joys of fusion food. Her journey transports us from the clamor of Noah’s Ark to the calm of the British Museum, from the Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages to the banks of the River Tigris. As Samantha considers what we lose and keep, she also asks what we might need to let go of to preserve our culture and ourselves.
Always Carry Salt is an immersive and moving meditation on the words and traditions that shape us and what we carry forward into future generations.

Library Journal Reviews

Ellis (How To Be a Heroine: Or, What I've Learned from Reading Too Much) explores her Iraqi Jewish culture, reflecting on a language facing extinction. Due to displacement from Iraq and religious discrimination, fewer and fewer people speak Judeo-Iraqi Arabic. In this potent memoir, Ellis describes navigating motherhood while grappling with how to celebrate and share her culture without passing on generational trauma. She dedicates herself to learning the language, hoping to reconnect with others and build back the vocabulary and grammar she has forgotten. She also immerses herself in the foods of her childhood and the memories of her parents. The memoir is loosely divided into three parts: exploring how language fades, how cultural traditions are preserved, and how to shift from the stress of the "there and then" to the hope of the "here and now." Ellis narrates her own account, adding a layer of gravity to her family stories as she describes her family's efforts to leave Iraq and her joy at seeing her son enjoy traditional Iraqi Jewish foods. It is both sobering and moving to hear her speak Judeo-Iraqi Arabic. VERDICT A tender and emotional meditation on culture, community, and heritage.—Zoey Colglazier