This book is totally Chocolat + Maeve Binchy + Sarah Addison Allen. I loved this. Three sisters who escaped Iran during the revolution escaped to London. After 7 years there they moved to a tiny village in Ireland to open a cafe. The village is populated with stock characters-a huge bully who dominates the whole town, a drunk with a fascinating past, mischievous bordering on criminal boys, a nosy gossip, etc. The sisters are scandalously foreign and the bully immediately wants to get rid of them. The racism is completely awful, but as I read I was confident that this story would end happily and he would get his.
Marjan, the oldest, has a gift for cooking and recipes are sprinkled throughout. And there is a thread of magical realism, which I loved. Her recipes have a special effect on people. Another sister’s intoxicating scent affects people. And the sweet Italian widow, Estelle, sweats sugar. For real.
I just loved this. For all the sweet magical recipe stuff and comically outlandish bully, there are serious flashbacks to the girls’ life in Iran before they escaped. It was truly awful and traumatic.
I just found out there’s a sequel, so I can’t wait to read it!
The Last Book I Read 