Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel

This book is delightful-- it's fast, it's funny, and delicious in both words and imagined recipes. I attempted a recipe (I made October's Cream Fritters) and it was a disaster, hence I recommend only imagining the recipes.  Maybe Mexican eggs at the time were different or maybe the recipes are intended to be like the rest of the story: rooted in some reality but embellished with broad strokes of magical realism. Years ago, sister Gertrudis ran off with a general in the army in a particularly unexpected and visually memorable spectacle. Cream fritters were here favorite so when she brings all the troops back home, cream fritters get served. Each food has a story, each story has some unexpected twists, and each character fits an archetype that makes them both easily understood and surprising all at once. 

"Like Water For Chocolate" is a reference to a hot chocolate recipe. The water should boil then be taken off the heat so it comes very close to boiling over, but does not. There is plenty of sensuality in this book-- sex is part of these characters lives and drives many of their decisions and passions-- and there's also plenty of anger. "Boiling over" has multiple meanings in this book and what I enjoyed most about each chapter was the frankness with which each character staked their claim to reality. Sometimes it left me guessing and sometimes it was crystal clear, but I never thought the characters themselves were confused. These women know what they want and they use the structures of life available to them to make the most. Sometimes I was surprised, sometimes not, but I was always delighted. 

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