Chocolat (1999)

Good light reading. It always makes me hungry. I felt a vague sense of shame when I bought this -- rather cheaply, I think -- and snuck it home, but I own it now. Joanne Harris writes better than I'd expected, and there's something very compelling and more-ish about her writing. Her books in general are my comfort reading, and I suspect I'll be returning to Chocolat before too long, once I've exhausted my supply of her work, carefully spaced out to be most effectively comforting.

I love the magic that weaves through the story -- the magical realism, I suppose, though completely unpretentious and natural seeming. Tantalising, too, because there's never quite enough of it. ( )

I must have read Chocolat quite a few times by now. It's an entrancing book: I didn't used to want to admit I'd read it, with its sensuality and femininity and the barely-there magic, but I now admit to it gladly -- I've read almost all of Joanne Harris' output, and I love the way she writes. There's something moreish about it, no matter what she's writing about. A lot of her stories have a similar sort of narrative arc; I wouldn't read too many of them back to back. But it's a comforting warm world to come to, with the domestic and yet magical delights of food front and centre, when you need somewhere.

I actually read it this time with an astonishing amount of sympathy for Reynaud, perhaps prompted by the knowledge that there is now a third book in which he crops up again. I'm looking forward to reading that, either over the next few days or in July, when I'm (blech) recovering from my operation. Regardless, I do love the delicate magic of these books, more hinted at that stated outright, which somehow makes it more intoxicating. ( )

This book and the movie of the same name are two separate, different but equal experiences for me. I just reread this book and got more out of it than I did the first time. Vianne Rocher grew up with a peripatetic mother who was dying of cancer for much of Vianne's youth. The mother was running from her own death as well a a dark secret in her past. The two were very close and travelled the world always scrabbling a bare existence at the edge of poverty. They changed their names frequently as they slipped out of town after town to escape a variety of different bad experiences. The mother romantized the life in every way in order to make Vianne's life a magical one instead of a sordid one and she succeeded at this.

Now Vianne has a daughter of her own and is living a life somewhat resembling the one she lived with her mother, but she has developed a skill and a profession. What she has learned to do with chocolate is truly magical, but will she and her daughter ever have a home and possessions of their own? Vianne sees some definite possibilities in this small French village but the local priest has control issues and works to keep all strangers at bay using one excuse or another. As in any morality tale the fight of good over evil is always interesting. Especially what one defines as good or evil. ( )

ugh. Yet another badly written first person narrative. Blah.

A "sweet" book. I haven't seen the film so can't compare it. A quick read for me - finished in one night. I wasn't quite sure what time era it was set, and initially thought it was the 1950's, but that proved to be not the case. I read it as a fantasy story, it had that once upon a time quality right down to the end with the priest getting his just desserts and everything turning out all right in the end. ( )