Nov 01, 2004 11:10 PM
6223 Views
(Updated Nov 01, 2004 11:10 PM)
Delicious?Sweet...Salivating?.Addictive?Tempting?Sinful?Indulging ?Scrumptious?Delectable?or simply but aptly, mmmm Yummy?....these members of vocabulary do rounds in my mind when I hear something called chocolate. Had heard somewhere that as with most fine things, chocolate too has its season.
There is a simple memory aid that you can use to determine whether it is the correct time to order chocolate dishes: any month whose name contains the letter A, E, or U is the proper time for chocolate. I can see the curve of your lips going up. Not surprisingly, a research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate.
That was a prelude for the review on ''CHOCOLAT'' by Joanne Harris. Undoubtedly, a FUN and SWEET book to be engaged with. If crafted in one sentence, it sure is a luscious tale of Church versus Chocolate.
The novel traces 40 whole days in the life of a little French village, beginning with Mardi Gras and ending with Easter Sunday. Vianne Rocher, her six-year old toddler Anouk and her imaginary rabbit friend Pantoufle walk into Lansquenet-sous-Tannes on the carnival day, decide to settle into a bakery across from the Catholic church and the eyes of its pastor Pere Francis Reynaud, and set up La Celeste Praline, a Chocolaterie.
Vianne, with her her shop, brings a touch of luxury and a splash of color to the otherwise conservative village. She knows the favorite sweets of her customers without asking, or possibly the way she can pull their deepest wishes and worries from them with just the slightest touch. Vianne's arrival changes the town, for better and for worse.
Reynaud, the Black Man, is threatened by everything that Vianne represents and fights back through manipulation of his flock whom he nevertheless despises. It all comes to a head with the children's plea for a Grand Festival du Chocolat for Easter, when Vianne will make ''a thousand and one epiphanies of spun-sugar magic-carpet rides more suited to an Arabian harem then the solemnities of the Passion.''
Joanne Harris's novels read like adult fairy tales;charming, curious and threaded with magical realism. The beautiful fabric that she weaves with such innocence and simplicity without being flowery is bound to bowl you over. Ms. Harris does a wonderful job with the character development of the residents, contriving a close examination of the concepts of friendship, obsession, pride, and asceticism.
You actually feel the characters and their pain, temptation, vulnerability, and also their release, freedom, delight and their smile.
Apart from the chief theme, the novel also attends to issues like violence against women, racism, rights for the senior citizens, bigotry and euthanasia. The main highlight of the story is the sensual magic of chocolate carried out by an individual to change people?s lives.
By the closing stages of the novel, we come to believe the fine line we all walk when we deny ourselves of pleasure, and consequently end up making the object of denial an obsession. A wonderful story?beautifully told?and better savored with a bar ... or more correctly, ... bars of chocolate!!!
