Like Water for Chocolate: a Novel in Monthly Installments with Recipes, Romances

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • Earthy, magical, and utterly charming, this tale of family life in turn-of-the-century Mexico blends poignant romance, bittersweet wit, and delicious recipes.

This classic love story takes place on the De la Garza ranch, as the tyrannical owner, Mama Elena, chops onions at the kitchen table in her final days of pregnancy. While still in her mother’s womb, her daughter to be weeps so violently she causes an early labor, and little Tita slips out amid the spices and fixings for noodle soup. This early encounter with food soon becomes a way of life, and Tita grows up to be a master chef, using cooking to express herself and sharing recipes with readers along the way.

Laura Esquivel is the award-winning author of Like Water for Chocolate, which has sold more than four and a half million copies around the world in 35 languages, as well as The Law of Love, and most recently, Between Two Fires. She lives in Mexico City.

Thomas Christensen is the author of 1616: Intimations of Modernity , New World/New Words: Translating Latin American Literature, and with his wife Carol Christensen, The U.S.–Mexican War. He has translated works by Carlos Fuentes, Alejo Carpentier, and Julio Cortázar. His translation of Louis-Ferdinand Céline’s Ballets Without Music, Without Dancers, Without Anything was a finalist for the PEN Center USA West Literary Award in translation. He is director of publications at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco.