Encuéntrame En El Cupcake Café (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
This charming novel is part pursue-your-passion, part romance, and does both well. Set in present day London. Issy is found to be redundant (British for laid off) at her job and takes her severance pay to invest in a very chancy cupcake-and-tea (or coffee or other beverage) café in a dodgy location. Meanwhile, her romantic life is going about as well as her professional life. Great characters populate Issy's life and some moments are chuckle-out-loud funny. This is a very well done book. The recipes look delicious but the measurements are in grams and milliliters and so on, with some ingredients that seem to be available only in Britain--which is only to be expected for a book published there, but I wish there had been some American translation. Issy's relationship to her grandfather is especially touching and fine. This book was slow in starting but I decided to slog through. I almost gave it up again at the end but thought, I've made it this far....First, tons of recipes included, however to this experienced baker they sounded for the most part difficult and in many cases just too cute as they were placed in the story. That was also part of the problem with our heroine, Issy (christened Isabel) who is brought up as a baker at her beloved Grandfather's flour coated elbow. All grown up, she constantly bakes for people at her office job and those she rides the bus with. Except for when her supposed boyfriend and boss deigns to pick her up and give her a ride nearly to work. They're sleeping together yet he gives her no indication she's about to be laid off.Issy ends up taking over a rundown vacant spot to open the Cupcake Cafe. Said boyfriend drifts in and out of her life becoming more melodramatically nasty with each appearance. You can almost hear the audience hiss....The problem here is that so many of the characters are whiny and refuse to break the past ties that bind them to those problems or people. By the end of the book, things improbably resolve themselves for some people and not others. It's more of non-fiction than, fiction.Noticed there's a second book in the series but not for me, moving on....
What do You think about Encuéntrame En El Cupcake Café (2012)?
Very good book to read and relax with. looking forward to reading the next book.
—adygbr
