I'm conflicted. On the one hand, it's a beautiful book. On the other hand, holy crap I hate Pedro. He might be the worse love interest in any form of media I've come across, just for the sheer LACK OF REASON anyone with common sense would go for him. Like dude, he give no incentive.
one of the weirdest feelings is reading an amazing book that you love and then having no one to talk to about it because you read it by yourself ... think that is why I like watching great book reviews like this one
I’m doing my A Levels (if you’re not British it’s the exams we do when we are 18) and for my Spanish we have to read this book, in fact my exam is tomorrow, hence why I am watching this. It’s quite interesting though cause all of us rly hated this book, bare in mind we read it in Spanish, but I’ve seen so many people who loved it, which I was genuinely surprised at
@@finlaywilliams4746 hmm … it’s v. abstract but I think it’s a beautiful allegory. Definitely look up info about how it’s an allegory for the Mexican Revolution
Oh gosh! I've read this book two years ago and still can't get over it. This is definitely my most favorite book! By the way, your reactions are so raw, not scripted! Haha
(SPOILER ALERT) I think the narrative does explain, it was the only way to stay close to tita and on the other hand, there were not a lot of available women in those circles, plus mom is still the ultimate authority in families even today, and some loose perspective and scale in the practice, pretty selfish lady the mom, even then, you can see other characters feeling the same way, but you can also see no one really intervened, some didn't even flinched, which is a sign that it wasn't so rare to see things like that, the mom has spoken, she's the head of her house, that's it, nobody's business. My opinion is that all women were stubborn to their own mind, all could have been happier, but they kept moving on or against rules and convention, one sister was all pleasure, the other all conventionalism, Tita all love, the mother all will, Pedro took a corner, just to stay in the room, and everyone kept life going in their own terms, in our time, all irrelevant, in their time, the right thing to do, hope I made sense, ✌🏼
***** I wasn't sure about it, it's not my typical genre, but I am so glad I gave it a try. I was extremely amazed at how good it is! And how much I loved it! Let me know if you read it!!
ok ok i'll listen to you, i added it to my kindle list even though i'm not entirely sure about it but you got me with the old cook and the ending thing, i'll give it a go
OH I love this book so much! I've read it twice. Have you seen the movie? it's just as mad and awesome as the book, although the characters look nothing like I imagined, but when do they ever do. The rivers of vomit! Oh, the rivers of vomit! They always made me laugh, the over the top-ness of it all! I love it. I have the movie cover edition which is pretty poxy, movie copies are the worst, but I have to say, I hope you don't mind me saying, I prefer it to the copy you have!! If they made an edition with a gorgeous cover it would be the perfect book OH and the perfect gift. It has everything and is so easy to read! I also read it in one day and then again in one day. Absalutely NO self control! But this is the type of book that lends it self to be eaten in one gulp. I think perhaps if you read it slowly and analysied in page by page, you wouldn't enjoy it as much. I don't think it's a book you want to think too deeply about or to use the hot new phrase 'too critically' about. The soap opera-y parts of it especially. But I loved this book soooo much. it's the greatest. It's like my comfort book. Oh and I loved the other sister....can't remember her name but I remember she was like a light or a hope, she got out of there (i think) and that always made me happy! AWESOME VIDEO. I hope it made people who haven;t read the book give it a go because it is just so darn enjoyable. Loved this video Joe :D xxx
Sophie The Uneducated Reader I haven't seen the movie!!! I MUST though!!! Definitely not offended, the cover on mine is really bad. lol! You are so right- this is the PERFECT book gift!!! I'm also relieved I'm not the only one with self control issues. Once I started I couldn't stop! Yes, the sister that ran away and became some sort of officer in the war! I LOVED that!!! In one family we had a "typical" daughter - married/children, the wild one, and the poor neglected/abused daughter. I also love that it's Tita's story & not one of the others. From the outside her life looked dull and bleak, but holy moly did she have one heck of a life!!! Lots of sorrow, but the power her cooking had over people was awesome. Totally agree about reading critically- reading is a hobby. I'm not in school. I want to enjoy my books, not analyze every sentence! I REALLY hope people pick up this book!!
ok, i have to say all the characters from this book have 0 depth and do not make sense at all! i mean, really, tita only has like 3 feelings; sadness, freezing sadness and wanting to hook up desesperately. the only character with some depth at all (when you dig deep, because the author tries to make us dislike them just as she does) is mama elena. when you think about it, she is the only character that is not simply angry or bland for no reason whatsoever, like tita. tita has no personality throughout the entirety of the book and there’s not an actual reason for that. in addition, when you think about it, nacha dies because tita can’t control her emotions over a guy she exchanged 6 sentences with. all the feminine characters were also attached and completely dependent on some random man (when the man lets them down, they feel utterly broken on the inside, when the man is happy, they feel better), for instance, when tita freaked out about the baby and killed the bird and all of that, she remained silent for 6 months, never actually trying to get better, while john literally saved her (he took care of her and she was just “yeah well, i’ll continue like this bc john is helping me and giving me showers but you know what? i want to talk, if only john could do that for me”) and that ending???????? damn that is worse than wattpad fan fiction and i have to say i did NOT see that coming. i couldn’t feel anything else but dispais, extreme disgust and anger. just why? why make him die inside of her? and then sHE KILLED HERSELF? my friends, where is the feminism here? the sense here? i think it might have died with jose treviño. i’m sorry, but i don’t think this book should be nearly as hyped as it is today, especially because it does not fit our society anymore and gives us this distorted idea that it is always someone else’s fault and we should always choose “true love”, even if that true love is only represented by lust and “gleaming” looks and they are a freaking douchebag that could not care less about consent nor the partner’s feelings - which, for me, does kind of sound like abuse. - i don’t mean to be disrespectful to anyone who’s liked the book, i just think there are a lot of way better options out there with strong female characters and well developed relationships (in which the partners are whole and complement each other without that toxic thing of simply having to be with each other to ever have a chance of being happy)
I love this comment!!!! I was seriously thinking the same thing! Tita was bland at best, and she never really had anything going for her except Pedro and the kitchen. What good traits for your main character.
What do you think about the second sister who drove herself so hot and mad for the lieutenant and and went away naked as a jaybird I thought that was funny some of the things that happen after Peter made some of the food is hilarious thank you for going over this book it was very enjoyable now talking with somebody else makes it feel like a experience not by myself
Can i ask question? What is the significance of fire in the novel and how it relates to making and consumption of food? Please can anyone answer this right now? I needed it badly. Thank you🙂
the fire is that usual kind of cliché representation of love, happiness and lust and tita can (unaware of that) implement those feelings in the recipes to make people feel what she feels. like in rosaura and pedro's marriage, when she was feeling so devastated and heart-broken that she put that feeling in the cake while she was cooking. afterwards, we learn that nacha died because of it, mama elena cried and rosaura, along with other guests, threw up all over her dress. or when gertrudis ate her "codornices en pétalos de rosas" and felt such lust, she eloped with a random soldier while horse riding/galloping.
Hi Jo! I like your video on the Like Water of Chocolat, my friend and I we are doing a book club, we are trying to figure out the mood and the setting of the first four chapters, could you please help us? Thanks a lot!
This is interesting as far as the magical realism goes, but it sounds way too maudlin and melodramatic for me. On the other hand, your enthusiasm is great. Maybe I'll check it out when I'm looking for something wildly romantic in the springtime or something!
***** Perhaps you could call my video maudlin. (har har) ;-) I obsessively read lists of "Must Read" books & when I find them @ the Goodwill I compulsively buy them. (Obsessive/Compulsive, that's me!) When I sat down to read this book, I thought... wtf. I was extremely surprised. It's definitely a book you can't take seriously. It's the equivalent of watching Nick @ Night-- entertaining and mindless.
To my perspective, I absolutely despised Like Water For Chocolate. Forbidding a young girl to marry or have freedom, especially someone who is Truthful, Intelligent, Thankful, and Amazing is just complete rubbish. Her evil mother is kind to everyone else except Tita, which makes no sense and is beyond unusual. If I ever encountered a family tradition that denies someone using the window of opportunity, I would 100% break it. With all that you have entailed, this book is ludicrous, wasteful, facetious, and careless. The novel doesn't resemble my identity or anything I wish to pursue. Other than my opinion, I admire your analysis of how you described the story in a concise way.
Self flagellating trash. Going, oh poor me, poor me, my lot in life sucks because of my family traditions because they are set in stone. I don't know how you could like a book that has characters who are so poorly written. "The love of her life, who dropped her like a bag of feces because her mother told him to for her sister." Sudden plot twists at the end of the book can't save crap. Go read a book like, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Or, Love in the Time of Cholera. A book that can't be read in a single sitting.
In terms of romances and romance culture, this book takes it to the fucking extreme. A particular fantasy extreme you can’t find in Milan Kundera and which Márquez never wrote about.
Clifford Gordon he didn’t drop her btw he only married Rosaura to be closer to Tita, he initially wanted to marry Tita but couldn’t so he did what he could to be close to her , he literally prays before having sex for the first time with Rosaura and never does it again , he doesn’t love her but feels he owes it to her to be a good man as he is technically her husband. Just saying 😂
@@Kingston997 well, he never really tried to be a good man and specially not a good husband. he kept cheating on rosaura with tita and, at the beginning, he created the draft of a shitty plan and decided to marry rosaura "for" tita. of course, he knew he would consequently screw rosaura's chances of ever having a good and loving marriage, and did he care about that? not at all, he married her anyway. surely no "good man" would do that, even if his plan was agreeable. and he is a piece of shit for being so selfish, egocentric and coward all the goddamn time.
I'm conflicted. On the one hand, it's a beautiful book. On the other hand, holy crap I hate Pedro. He might be the worse love interest in any form of media I've come across, just for the sheer LACK OF REASON anyone with common sense would go for him. Like dude, he give no incentive.
one of the weirdest feelings is reading an amazing book that you love and then having no one to talk to about it because you read it by yourself ... think that is why I like watching great book reviews like this one
Lets talk about the book pleaseee
I’m doing my A Levels (if you’re not British it’s the exams we do when we are 18) and for my Spanish we have to read this book, in fact my exam is tomorrow, hence why I am watching this. It’s quite interesting though cause all of us rly hated this book, bare in mind we read it in Spanish, but I’ve seen so many people who loved it, which I was genuinely surprised at
@@finlaywilliams4746 hmm … it’s v. abstract but I think it’s a beautiful allegory. Definitely look up info about how it’s an allegory for the Mexican Revolution
Oh gosh! I've read this book two years ago and still can't get over it. This is definitely my most favorite book! By the way, your reactions are so raw, not scripted! Haha
I am an Australian poet researching magical realism for a poem sequence I am writing. I enjoyed your review of this wonderful novel - thank you.
i love how you break and explain it in details, you could be a professional at this
(SPOILER ALERT) I think the narrative does explain, it was the only way to stay close to tita and on the other hand, there were not a lot of available women in those circles, plus mom is still the ultimate authority in families even today, and some loose perspective and scale in the practice, pretty selfish lady the mom, even then, you can see other characters feeling the same way, but you can also see no one really intervened, some didn't even flinched, which is a sign that it wasn't so rare to see things like that, the mom has spoken, she's the head of her house, that's it, nobody's business.
My opinion is that all women were stubborn to their own mind, all could have been happier, but they kept moving on or against rules and convention, one sister was all pleasure, the other all conventionalism, Tita all love, the mother all will, Pedro took a corner, just to stay in the room, and everyone kept life going in their own terms, in our time, all irrelevant, in their time, the right thing to do, hope I made sense, ✌🏼
I love your faces while making the review...your cat is funny as well.
Great review!!! I have heard about this book for years and have never read it. Now I REALLY want to! It sounds great.
***** I wasn't sure about it, it's not my typical genre, but I am so glad I gave it a try. I was extremely amazed at how good it is! And how much I loved it! Let me know if you read it!!
Jo ReadsBooks I went out of town this weekend to shop and I bought it while I was there. Hopefully I can get to it soon!
***** I'm so excited to hear you got it!!!! Enjoy!!
It's a great story and thanks for the wonderful book review!
It's true telenovela style!!! And I read this twice!! And hit home cuz I'm the youngest.... don't even remember how how I found it the 1st time
ok ok i'll listen to you, i added it to my kindle list even though i'm not entirely sure about it but you got me with the old cook and the ending thing, i'll give it a go
chicklebird You HAVE to read it. It's not long and it moves very quickly.
I read it years ago, awesome tale!
OH I love this book so much! I've read it twice. Have you seen the movie? it's just as mad and awesome as the book, although the characters look nothing like I imagined, but when do they ever do.
The rivers of vomit! Oh, the rivers of vomit! They always made me laugh, the over the top-ness of it all! I love it.
I have the movie cover edition which is pretty poxy, movie copies are the worst, but I have to say, I hope you don't mind me saying, I prefer it to the copy you have!! If they made an edition with a gorgeous cover it would be the perfect book OH and the perfect gift. It has everything and is so easy to read!
I also read it in one day and then again in one day. Absalutely NO self control! But this is the type of book that lends it self to be eaten in one gulp. I think perhaps if you read it slowly and analysied in page by page, you wouldn't enjoy it as much. I don't think it's a book you want to think too deeply about or to use the hot new phrase 'too critically' about. The soap opera-y parts of it especially. But I loved this book soooo much. it's the greatest. It's like my comfort book.
Oh and I loved the other sister....can't remember her name but I remember she was like a light or a hope, she got out of there (i think) and that always made me happy!
AWESOME VIDEO. I hope it made people who haven;t read the book give it a go because it is just so darn enjoyable. Loved this video Joe :D xxx
Sophie The Uneducated Reader I haven't seen the movie!!! I MUST though!!! Definitely not offended, the cover on mine is really bad. lol! You are so right- this is the PERFECT book gift!!! I'm also relieved I'm not the only one with self control issues. Once I started I couldn't stop! Yes, the sister that ran away and became some sort of officer in the war! I LOVED that!!! In one family we had a "typical" daughter - married/children, the wild one, and the poor neglected/abused daughter. I also love that it's Tita's story & not one of the others. From the outside her life looked dull and bleak, but holy moly did she have one heck of a life!!! Lots of sorrow, but the power her cooking had over people was awesome. Totally agree about reading critically- reading is a hobby. I'm not in school. I want to enjoy my books, not analyze every sentence! I REALLY hope people pick up this book!!
Hi iam from mexicooo.
ok, i have to say all the characters from this book have 0 depth and do not make sense at all! i mean, really, tita only has like 3 feelings; sadness, freezing sadness and wanting to hook up desesperately. the only character with some depth at all (when you dig deep, because the author tries to make us dislike them just as she does) is mama elena. when you think about it, she is the only character that is not simply angry or bland for no reason whatsoever, like tita. tita has no personality throughout the entirety of the book and there’s not an actual reason for that.
in addition, when you think about it, nacha dies because tita can’t control her emotions over a guy she exchanged 6 sentences with. all the feminine characters were also attached and completely dependent on some random man (when the man lets them down, they feel utterly broken on the inside, when the man is happy, they feel better), for instance, when tita freaked out about the baby and killed the bird and all of that, she remained silent for 6 months, never actually trying to get better, while john literally saved her (he took care of her and she was just “yeah well, i’ll continue like this bc john is helping me and giving me showers but you know what? i want to talk, if only john could do that for me”)
and that ending???????? damn that is worse than wattpad fan fiction and i have to say i did NOT see that coming. i couldn’t feel anything else but dispais, extreme disgust and anger. just why? why make him die inside of her? and then sHE KILLED HERSELF?
my friends, where is the feminism here? the sense here? i think it might have died with jose treviño. i’m sorry, but i don’t think this book should be nearly as hyped as it is today, especially because it does not fit our society anymore and gives us this distorted idea that it is always someone else’s fault and we should always choose “true love”, even if that true love is only represented by lust and “gleaming” looks and they are a freaking douchebag that could not care less about consent nor the partner’s feelings - which, for me, does kind of sound like abuse.
- i don’t mean to be disrespectful to anyone who’s liked the book, i just think there are a lot of way better options out there with strong female characters and well developed relationships (in which the partners are whole and complement each other without that toxic thing of simply having to be with each other to ever have a chance of being happy)
I love this comment!!!! I was seriously thinking the same thing! Tita was bland at best, and she never really had anything going for her except Pedro and the kitchen. What good traits for your main character.
What do you think about the second sister who drove herself so hot and mad for the lieutenant and and went away naked as a jaybird I thought that was funny some of the things that happen after Peter made some of the food is hilarious thank you for going over this book it was very enjoyable now talking with somebody else makes it feel like a experience not by myself
Have you seen the movie too!!
Can i ask question?
What is the significance of fire in the novel and how it relates to making and consumption of food?
Please can anyone answer this right now? I needed it badly.
Thank you🙂
the fire is that usual kind of cliché representation of love, happiness and lust and tita can (unaware of that) implement those feelings in the recipes to make people feel what she feels. like in rosaura and pedro's marriage, when she was feeling so devastated and heart-broken that she put that feeling in the cake while she was cooking. afterwards, we learn that nacha died because of it, mama elena cried and rosaura, along with other guests, threw up all over her dress. or when gertrudis ate her "codornices en pétalos de rosas" and felt such lust, she eloped with a random soldier while horse riding/galloping.
You can listen to the Audio Book here! ruclips.net/video/xTTLkJjuWfM/видео.html
Hey , thanks for the summary 😊 it was great and helpful 👍
I love this book so much!! 📖
the cover is amazing wdym aaaa
Hi Jo! I like your video on the Like Water of Chocolat, my friend and I we are doing a book club, we are trying to figure out the mood and the setting of the first four chapters, could you please help us? Thanks a lot!
This is interesting as far as the magical realism goes, but it sounds way too maudlin and melodramatic for me. On the other hand, your enthusiasm is great. Maybe I'll check it out when I'm looking for something wildly romantic in the springtime or something!
***** Perhaps you could call my video maudlin. (har har) ;-) I obsessively read lists of "Must Read" books & when I find them @ the Goodwill I compulsively buy them. (Obsessive/Compulsive, that's me!) When I sat down to read this book, I thought... wtf. I was extremely surprised. It's definitely a book you can't take seriously. It's the equivalent of watching Nick @ Night-- entertaining and mindless.
That's really good to hear because that means it'll be perfect for a vacation read!
I watched this video before reading the novel.
I expected Nacha to live at least to the middle point of the book, but she didn’t 😭
I wanna read the second part
Second part?
Imposible
To my perspective, I absolutely despised Like Water For Chocolate. Forbidding a young girl to marry or have freedom, especially someone who is Truthful, Intelligent, Thankful, and Amazing is just complete rubbish. Her evil mother is kind to everyone else except Tita, which makes no sense and is beyond unusual. If I ever encountered a family tradition that denies someone using the window of opportunity, I would 100% break it. With all that you have entailed, this book is ludicrous, wasteful, facetious, and careless. The novel doesn't resemble my identity or anything I wish to pursue.
Other than my opinion, I admire your analysis of how you described the story in a concise way.
That cat lol - 3:15
Btw, I believe if you make your background simpler, I wouldn't get distracted with everything in it. Sorry XD
I hated the magical realism and Pedro so far.I haven't finished it yet though and people keep spoiling it.
My book has a much better cover, it's a drawing of a young woman and a little girl in the kitchen with onions in a bowl on the counter
Spoiler alert !!!!
Self flagellating trash. Going, oh poor me, poor me, my lot in life sucks because of my family traditions because they are set in stone. I don't know how you could like a book that has characters who are so poorly written. "The love of her life, who dropped her like a bag of feces because her mother told him to for her sister." Sudden plot twists at the end of the book can't save crap. Go read a book like, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Or, Love in the Time of Cholera. A book that can't be read in a single sitting.
In terms of romances and romance culture, this book takes it to the fucking extreme. A particular fantasy extreme you can’t find in Milan Kundera and which Márquez never wrote about.
Clifford Gordon he didn’t drop her btw he only married Rosaura to be closer to Tita, he initially wanted to marry Tita but couldn’t so he did what he could to be close to her , he literally prays before having sex for the first time with Rosaura and never does it again , he doesn’t love her but feels he owes it to her to be a good man as he is technically her husband. Just saying 😂
@@Kingston997 well, he never really tried to be a good man and specially not a good husband. he kept cheating on rosaura with tita and, at the beginning, he created the draft of a shitty plan and decided to marry rosaura "for" tita. of course, he knew he would consequently screw rosaura's chances of ever having a good and loving marriage, and did he care about that? not at all, he married her anyway. surely no "good man" would do that, even if his plan was agreeable. and he is a piece of shit for being so selfish, egocentric and coward all the goddamn time.