Elle Eggels

I notice that this book has been compared to both `Like Water for Chocolate' and `Chocolat' which really surprises me, because I adored those two books and really struggled to finish this one.

I had high hopes that this would be a book with beautiful imagery and incredible descriptions of food- but it was instead a dull piece of fiction with what could have been interesting little sub-plots glossed over far too quickly and too many characters that never really felt true to life. I didn't care show more about a single one of them or what happened to them and the ending of this novel felt very rushed- though by that point I was actually past caring if I'm honest.

The book centres on the lives of seven sisters told across thirty-odd years but is not structured in a linear fashion and shifts all over the place to various episodes in the lives of the sisters at random points in time, which is incredibly irritating. A linear structure would have made for more involved reading, at least on my part. The narrative is also told from the point of view of the daughter of one of the sisters- but she remains a bit of a non-entity and I found it hard to focus on anything interesting about her. Her `voice' is also a bit pretentious and fanciful for my liking- though this could be put down to the translation of the story from Dutch.

The plot itself is basically a recap of the relationships between the sisters themselves- for when their other relationships fall apart (for whatever reason and they always do) they can always return home to the family bakery and make tarts, forsaking any other interest that they may have had in their lives to keep the family business afloat. Oh joy. How utterly depressing! Bleak is not the word.

It seems I'm in the minority in really disliking this novel (on Amazon) but I really cannot recommend this book. Maybe for me, it all just got lost in translation- but I completely fail to see what is so wonderful about it.

*This review also appears on Amazon.co.uk* show less

Die Idee des Buches gefällt mir immer noch gut, aber die Stimme der Erzählerin ist so...kahl und kalt gewesen, dass ich mir nur sehr schwer die sehr spannende Welt der Schwestern vorstellen konnte, als ob ein Filter drüber gelegt war, damit man es nie so richtig erkennen kann, um was es eigentlich geht, und wie groß eine Sache ist, oder auch nicht. Vielleicht ist dieser Filter bei der Übersetzung entstanden, kann ich nicht beurteilen. Insgesamt eine enttäuschende Erfahrung.

Niet zo meeslepend als het Het huis van de zeven zusters of Kroniek van een Onbegrepen Liefde.

What a disappointment. First, I never managed to finish this book, since I found it uninteresting and boring, especially when it came to characters and descriptions of the surroundings. So I never got to the second part when the sisters come back to the bakery. Regardless, this book is really not about food per se. Sorry, can't recommend this book more highly. The references to Chocolate and Like Water for Chocolate on the front are not fair - this book's quality is far below those books.