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I guess Dickens isn’t dead.

Written in 1989 by Laura Esquivel as a monthly serial, Like Water for Chocolate reminds me most of English classics like David Copperfield and Jayne Eyre. The book follows Tita, an unlucky girl who is fated to take care of her mother until she dies.

But unlike the oriental notion of filial piety, Tita is forbidden to marry or love. Her fate is made even crueler by the fact this isn’t some crazy Mexican thing, it’s just something her cunt of a mom made up.

Plot wise, Like Water for Chocolate is a basic Bildungsroman coming-of-age story, no surprises there.

Stylistically, Like Water for Chocolate uses food as a major theme. Tita is an excellent cook, and the food she prepares has strange almost magical powers.

At one point, her passion is made into a Quail with Rose Petal dish that her sister Gertrudis eats. Gertrudis then becomes so damn hot and bothered that she strips off her clothes, takes a shower (which explodes because of all the steam), immediately runs away naked, is picked up in the field by a handsome revolutionary, and embraces him on the back of the horse as they ride away into the war.

There’s also a Chicken Tornado.

So it comes as no surprise that Esquivel’s masterpiece is aimed at women. It’s not a particularly steamy romance novel, but some sections are intense. Men play rather un-important supporting roles, mostly acting as characters for women to be married to. The book begins every chapter with a recipe, and also takes a little time out to explain folk home remedies.

I didn’t find these sections too long or boring, they were only two paragraphs at the worst. Similarly difficult was the fact that Like Water for Chocolate is originally a Spanish language book. I don’t think much was lost in translation. The biggest problem any American is going to fully understanding the backdrop of the Mexican revolution.

Still, the book is a romantic, fantastical, and interesting read. The reading went by quickly, I think I finished it in 4 days or so. I liked it, though it’s hard to recommend to this group. Let me just say that Like Water for Chocolate is what we should have read instead of David Copperfield, you might not of ended up hating books so much.