Like Water for Chocolate

by Laura Esquivel • 1989

Like Water for Chocolate (Spanish: Como agua para chocolate) is a novel by Mexican novelist and screenwriter Laura Esquivel. The novel follows the story of a young girl named Tita, who longs for her lover, Pedro, but can never have him because of her mother's upholding of the family tradition: the youngest daughter cannot marry, but instead must take care of her mother until she dies. Tita is only able to express herself when she cooks. Esquivel employs magical realism to combine the supernatural with the ordinary throughout the novel. The novel won the American Booksellers Book of the Year Award for Adult Trade in 1994.