What a fantastic book to read on vacation in Switzerland (or anywhere, for that matter)! Chocolat, the breakthrough novel by Joanne Harris, tracks 40-days in the life of a sleepy little town in France., beginning with Mardi Gras, and ending with Easter Sunday.
Vianne Rocher -- suspected to be a witch -- and her daughter, Anouk, roll into town with the Mardi Gras carnival, decide to stay, and open a confiserie across the street from the town's Catholic Church and the eyes of its strict pastor, Pere Francis Reynaud.
Alternately told from the point of view of both Vianne and Pere Reynaud, the story deftly explores the inherent conflicts between following "the letter of the law" and "the spirit of the law" with regard to the church's teachings. Harris does a wonderful job with the character development of the townspeople, weaving in a close examination of the concepts of friendship, obsession, pride, and asceticism.
By the end of the novel you come to understand the fine line we all walk when we deny ourselves of pleasure, and consequently end up making the object of denial an obsession.
This is a positively FUN book to read. You will find yourself laughing aloud (or at least smiling broadly) throughout. Harris' prose is lush without being flowery as she drops you, like the protagonist, into a microcosm where the magic of confectionaries does seem able to solve nearly every problem.
