Esquivel, Laura - Like Water for Chocolate

[oyceter]

Tita and Pedro are in love, but because Tita is the youngest daughter of Mama Elena, tradition dictates that she can never wed so she can take care of her mother forever. Instead, Mama Elena arranges a marriage for her eldest daughter, Rosaura, and Pedro.

I'm guessing pretty much everyone knows that this is a book with foodie magical realism. When Tita cries into the batter, the guests who eat the finished dish are so affected by her grief that they vomit; when she uses the rose petals from the roses Pedro gave her, her sister Gerturdis is so inflamed by desire that she runs out naked to have sex with the first man she finds.

I really liked the foodie bits and the language. Unfortunately, I hated the characters and the general story, which is just the sort of love triangle that I absolutely detest. It was good that there were some older female characters that Tita likes to counteract Mama Elena, but I hate hate hated the way Tita and Rosaura are pitted against each other. It was even worse because though Tita is angry at Pedro for marrying her sister (seriously, WTF?), the main enemies are Rosaura and Mama Elena, and Rosaura is constantly jealous of Tita and engages in petty acts to hurt her. In my head, Rosaura and Tita team up and beat up on Pedro, because seriously! What was he thinking? Marrying one sister to be able to be close to another is such a phenomenally bad idea that I have no words!

Well, I have another of Esquivel's book, so we'll see how that one goes...

Comments

[shei.livejournal.com]

Oh man, one of the books from my childhood. I have to reread it some time.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Yep--I decided a few years back that I refuse to read, or watch, any more "triangle" stories in which the women are enemies.

[oyceter]

Yeeeeaaaah. I mean, I can tolerate it sometimes in kdramas, but it still drives me freaking insane.

[sophia-helix.livejournal.com]

I remember enjoying that in college, but mostly I remember the, um, unusual ending. I know it's magical realism, but that was just odd.

[oyceter]

Oh, huh, wait, what was it? Was it the way Rosaura randomly dies and it skips twenty years to the future? Or did I totally forget something?

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

YES! I haven't read the book, but we watched the movie in one of my Spanish classes in college. I liked the food bits, and even the depiction of the society and their class, but I hated the characters, especially Pedro. The second he actually agreed to marry the sister, the entire cast earned my hatred. It was just worse when they played him as tragic, and her mother and sister as evil.

There was one thing that made me especially mad in the movie, but you don't mention it here so I'll use spoiler code, in case they made it up for the movie.

What made it worse for me was the other guy who loved her-a docvtor, I think. He was nice an rich and loved her absolutely and knew about her and Pedro and would have stuck with her forever, and would never have agreed to marry her sister and then claimed that it was so they could still see each other. And she passed up on him to spend her life being ordered around by her mother and sister.

[magicnoire.livejournal.com]

Oh god, yes, I watched this movie in Spanish class too and I was like, "What? Are you serious?" the entire time.

On the other hand, a friend of mine made a cake or dessert or something from one of the included recipes and it was delicious.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I commented on this and left for work not 2 minutes later, and while I was driving, I realized that this is when I started hating love triangles, instead of just not getting why everyone loved them.

[oyceter]

No, that was in the book too. I'm also mad that the Other Guy gets to be nice and rescuing, but the Other Woman is evil, as always. Mostly I just want to whap Pedro over the head repeatedly.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

YES!!!

And that...is most romantic tangles out there. (And most kdramas...you've been lucky in what you've watched so far.) And so, in general principle, I hate romantic triangles and love squares, though I do sometime find some that I do like.

I think what made it worse in this case is that Pedro had no redeeming qualities to make us understand the choice.

[oyceter]

Yeah. I feel in kdramas, they exaggerate the niceness of the lead guy and the horrible-ness of the Other Woman so much that I am less angry at the characters and more angry at the writers. Whereas here, I was angry at the character, because as far as I could tell, I had no idea why Tita was in love with him at all.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Also in kdramas, they take the awfulness of the other woman to such lengths that a part of me tends to start enjoying her being evil. But yeah, in kdramas, at least the choices make sense, even if the characterization is sometimes irritating, and you know it's genre conventions dictating things.

This was just "WTF?" territory.

[delux-vivens.livejournal.com]

I liked the food aspects, and really liked the movie, but guess how the book worked my nerves?

Hint: Gertrudis.

[oyceter]

Yeeeeah, her storyline was, uh, problematic to say the least!

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

Now you've gotten me thinking about love triangles in books and movies.

I liked HENRY AND JUNE but maybe b/c it was based on real people, and reminded me of a real situation, where the two women are 'fighting' over the guy but love each other too, like, the emotions are more complex. Plus it was more obvious that June was kind of unstable and both Henry Miller and Anais Nin were worried about her, not just self-involved.

The ones where the women can so easily demonize each other (and never question it) are the irritating ones; even in the most painful real-life situation, most people do at some moments realize the other person is, after all, just another person like them and more than their role in the situation.

[oyceter]

Huh, yeah. I mean, I can watch stuff with triangles, but I really hate the ones that set up the couple as being in True Love and setting up the Other Woman as being the demonic other, even when the guy in the couple is usually acting like a total asshole and never getting called on it.

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

I remember really enjoying it when I was reading it, but I don't remember why and am wondering if it was my sentimental overemotional teenage self now.

[oyceter]

I mean, I liked the cooking bits, it was just the Rosaura-Tita rivalry that pissed me off. Especially because it was so polar... I don't think we ever got to see anything good about Rosaura, and the way she was treated in the end was really meant to be just humiliating for her.