Customer Reviews
A wonderful novel - By: P. DATTA, 25 Nov 2008 
Chocolat by Joanne Harris is a wonderful novel to read. It has been since last year that I watched the movie & it is absolutely brilliant. The novel deserves similar praise & comments for its refreshing story, colourful characters & beautiful village setting in rural France.
The sudden & unexpected entrance of Vianne & strange daughter Anouk to the village is the key plot to the story. The traditions & peace are ruined by their arrival. Vianee a pagan, opens up a confectionary to reunite a community. The coffee shop is a great opportunity for folks to share secrets & gossips. The parish view the confectionary as a disruption to village activities partiuclarly church services. A prominent parish member Father Reynaud is determined to preserve old village traditions. The opening of a confectionary clashes with Lent & this escalate matters. The temptation of chocolate urges the villagers to create a sin & not stick to Chrisitian vows. The gyspies presence bring further problems for the village & their is resentment towards their presence. The moral questions raised is what are the key implications of Vianne arrival to the village? Has she tarnished the village reputation ? That is the general gist of the story.
The religion & social predojuice are the key themes tackled in the novel. The novel looks at how Christianity conflicts with pagans beliefs as in the case of Vianne. In addition, it explores social predujuice in society. Humanity is presented in a positive & negative light. Overalll a wonderful novel to read.
Life is Like a Box of Chocolates... - By: Chris Drew, 29 Aug 2008 
Looking at alll the reviews below, opinion seem to be split between favouring & disliking this book. I'd seen the film a while ago, hadn't read any of these reviews & 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 actuallly 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 & 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) & Curé Reynaud (priest, & therefore morallly 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, & Reynaud's battle to try & get her, & the temptation she brings with her, out of the village. And that's it.
It's not alll 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 & 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 alll coffee flavoured.
Leaves a bad taste in the mouth - avoid.
Not bad - By: susie, 14 Jul 2008 
This is an easy read with some reallly lovely descriptive passages, but it failed to grab me entirely.
The plot centres on a mother & daughter who arrive in a smalll French village & open a chocolate shop opposite a church. The mother then tries to win over alll 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 reallly enchanting.
Unique read for Chocolate lovers! - By: LindyLouMac, 27 Jun 2008 Before reading The Lollipop Shoes in which Vianne Rocher returns, I decided to revisit Lasquenet during Lent & rediscover alll those wonderful characters.
Vianne & her daughter Anouk, mysterious strangers arrive in the village & open a chocolate shop which immediately begins to have a strange but generallly 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' & 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 & too little time to do so! Surprisingly though I enjoyed it just as much on this second reading. Joanne Harris writes very descriptively & you can almost taste the chocolates & 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 & use my own imagination!
Naive! - By: Philip Thompson, 26 May 2008 
Are we so simple that we need a story that is written so basicallly that it takes away alll excitement. The book mixes style between modern & 1950s which does not work well. I have to admit I gave up before the end as I couldn't endure any more!
