Product Description

Try me...Test me...Taste me. When an exotic stranger, Vianne Rocher, arrives in the French village of Lansquenet and opens a chocolate boutique directly opposite the church, Father Reynaud identifies her as a serious danger to his flock - especially as it is the beginning of Lent, the traditional season of self-denial. War is declared as the priest denounces the newcomer's wares as instruments of murder. Suddenly Vianne's shop-cum-cafe means that there is somewhere for secrets to be whispered, grievances to be aired, dreams to be tested. But Vianne's plans for an Easter Chocolate Festival divide the whole community in a conflict that escalates into a 'Church not Chocolate' battle. As mouths water in anticipation, can the solemnity of the Church compare with the pagan passion of a chocolate eclair? For the first time, here is a novel in which chocolate enjoys its true importance, emerging as a moral issue, as an agent of transformation - as well as a pleasure bordering on obsession. Rich, clever and mischievous, this is a triumphant read.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6722 in Books
• Published on: 2000-03-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review

I hear our M'sieur le Curé already has it in for you ... Does he know you're a witch?

Lansquenet-sous-Tannes--"a blip on the fast road between Toulouse and Bourdeaux"--and new home to Vianne Rocher, her six-year-old daughter Anouk, and Anouk's "imaginary" rabbit, Pantoufle. They arrive "on the wind of the carnival", and, a couple of days later, Vianne opens a luxuriant chocolate shop. "La Céleste Praline" bubbles over with the most tempting of confections, topped with an irresistible selection of rich, smooth chocolate drinks. It's Lent, the shop is opposite the church (which Vianne and Anouk don't attend) it's open on Sundays and Francis Reynaud, the austere parish priest with the "measuring, feline look" is not exactly happy.

As one by one the villagers sidle into the shop to sample Vianne's concoctions, we learn of their characters and secrets, their loves and desires, their troubles and hopes. Sad, polite Guillame and his dying dog. Shoplifting, beaten Joséphine Muscat. And Armande Voizin, still vigorous and perceptive in her 80s, who can see Pantoufle, and recognises Vianne for who she really is.

But Reynaud has his power base. And when Vianne advertises a Grand Festival of Chocolate to start on Easter Sunday, it's all-out war. War between church and chocolate.

Read clearly and precisely by Samantha Bond--whose voice is almost choclatey enough for Vianne--and Gareth Armstrong -- who sounds marginally too rich for Reynaud--this is an elegant adaptation of an utterly delicious novel, the denouement of which brings a new, literal meaning to the phrase "a sticky end", and which proves, indisputably, that soft centres are best. --Lisa Gee

Review
A wickedly delicious confection, mouth-watering and alluring. A woman of mysterious origins arrives with her daughter in a small, tightly knit, southern French village. She opens a chocolate shop, selling 'dreams, small comforts, sweet harmless temptations', to the fury of the village priest and his acolytes, who consider her wares 'Sodom and Gomorrah through a straw'. Soon her influence begins to percolate far beyond hot chocolate and fancy ribbons... A very special book. (Kirkus UK)

A first novel that rather cloyingly describes the transformations that overtake the residents of a small French village when a mysterious stranger and her daughter arrive and open a chocolate shop. The townspeople of Lansquenet live in the present day, but the patterns of their lives were established long before they were born - and change very little from year to year. A hamlet straight out of Flaubert, Lansquenet is filled with busybodies who have nothing better to do with their days than spy on one another, until two new arrivals provide fresh grist for the mill. What inspired Vivianne Rocher to move to Lansquenet with her daughter Anouk and to open a chocolate boutique is never explained, but her effect on the populace is profound and immediate: the grim little town and its sniping inhabitants are transformed through the magic of Vivianne's confections into an almost surreal assembly of sensualists, each somehow discovering in bonbons the key to happiness. Elderly crones find themselves remembering long-forgotten loves; shy young couples work up the nerve to break the ice. Is this all the result of only chocolate? Or is some more sinister force at work? The local priest suspects the worst, and his suspicions are reinforced by his awareness that Vivianne opened her shop on Shrove Tuesday - and thus has been tempting the entire parish from its Lenten austerities for the past six weeks. Now, she has even announced plans for a "Chocolate Festival" to take place on Easter Sunday itself! Horrified, he hatches a plan to foil her festivities, but God does not always side with the just. Who will win the soul of the town? Premise, prose, and pace all march along capably, but they fail nevertheless to raise the whole above the debilities of heavy symbolism and excruciatingly precious plot. (Kirkus Reviews)

Observer
‘A celebration of pleasure, of love, of tolerance.'

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Customer Reviews

Life is Like a Box of Chocolates...
Looking at all the reviews below, opinion seem to be split between favouring and disliking this book. I'd seen the film a while ago, hadn't read any of these reviews and borrowed it as a bit of light holiday reading. After completing it, I have to plant myself firmly in the negative camp.

Without re-iterating the arguments below, I measure the value of a novel in it's ability to generate a page-turning plot, well-rounded characters that you actually care about and, most importantly, to give the reader a revelatory insight either into themselves or the world around them.

Unfortunately this book does none of these things, unless of course I'm mistaken and rural France is a religiously repressed society ruled by tyrannical priests who gorge themselves in sinful acts such as arson, adultery and...eating chocolate. I'm sure the writer is mistaken.

The book is told from the perspective of two characters - Vianne Rocher (single mum, free spirit, mystical, likes cooking) and Curé Reynaud (priest, and therefore morally ambiguous, The Black Man). At the beginning of every chapter the only way we know who is narrating is that Reynaud says 'pére' a lot as he speaks to his comatosed forbear.

The plot revolves around Vianne opening her chocolat shop, the effect this has on the villagers, and Reynaud's battle to try and get her, and the temptation she brings with her, out of the village. And that's it.

It's not all bad, however, as the saving grace of the book is Armande's (old lady, diabetic, mystical) relationship with her grandson Luc (young man, s-stammers a lot), although these scenes are few and far between.

The magical, mystical element of the book was also lost on me. It leaves the reader thinking at the end, as with the whole of the book, what's the point?

Apparently life is like a box of chocolates as you never know what you're going to get. Unfortunately with this book, they're all coffee flavoured.

Leaves a bad taste in the mouth - avoid.

Not bad
This is an easy read with some really lovely descriptive passages, but it failed to grab me entirely.

The plot centres on a mother and daughter who arrive in a small French village and open a chocolate shop opposite a church. The mother then tries to win over all the people who are suspicious of her intentions.

Not a bad book, but I didn't care enough about the characters for it to be really enchanting.

Unique read for Chocolate lovers!
Before reading The Lollipop Shoes in which Vianne Rocher returns, I decided to revisit Lasquenet during Lent and rediscover all those wonderful characters.
Vianne and her daughter Anouk, mysterious strangers arrive in the village and open a chocolate shop which immediately begins to have a strange but generally good effect on the inhabitants. However the bigoted village priest Father Reynaud thinks she is there to turn his flock against their catholic religion. 'Church not Chocolate' is the true message of Easter according to some of the villagers. However there is also an element amongst the residents that just love Chocolate as I do myself! Around this theme we are told the stories of various villagers, amongst my favourites are Guillaume Duplessis who lives for his dog `Charly' and Armande Voizin a spirited local matriarch who does not intend to let failing health spoil her life.

Something I rarely do is read a book more than once unless studying it, as my thoughts are that there are too many books I want to read and too little time to do so! Surprisingly though I enjoyed it just as much on this second reading. Joanne Harris writes very descriptively and you can almost taste the chocolates and imagine yourself in the French countryside she describes. The trouble is having now seen the film I do tend to picture scenes from it rather than forming my own pictures in my mind. This is why I always prefer to read the book first, if it is made into a film and use my own imagination!