Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

As a boy, writer Jay Mackintosh spent three golden summers in the ramshackle home of "Jackapple Joe" Cox. A lonely child, he found solace in Old Joe's simple wisdom and folk charms. The magic was lost, however, when Joe disappeared without warning one fall. Years later, Jay's life is stalled with regret and ennui. His bestselling novel, Jackapple Joe, was published ten years earlier and he has written nothing... (more)

By Bread Alone

by Sarah-Kate Lynch

For Esme MacDougall Stack, it began in a old boulangerie in southwest France, where artisan-baker Louis Lapoine first introduced the innocent 19-year-old to the arts of making bread and making love. And then he broke her heart. Fifteen years later, Esme is living by the English seaside with her family, still baking bread, but no longer the idealistic girl she once was. Then an unexpected encounter in a London... (more)

Chocolat

by Joanne Harris

Greeted as "an amazement of riches ... few readers will be able to resist" by The New York Times , Chocolat is an enchanting novel about a small French town turned upside down by the arrival of a bewitching chocolate confectioner, Vianne Rocher, and her spirited young daughter.

The School of Essential Ingredients

by Erica Bauermeister

Reminiscent of Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate , a gorgeously written novel about life, love, and the magic of food. The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian’s Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen. Students include Claire, a young mother... (more)

Chez Moi

by Adriana Hunter, Agne?s Desarthe

A profound and tender novel about a woman’s troubled past— and her enduring love of cooking At forty-three, Myriam has been a wife, mother, and lover—but never a restauranteur. When she opens Chez Moi in a quiet neighborhood in Paris, she has no idea how to run a business, but armed only with her love of cooking, she is determined to try. Barely able to pay the rent, Myriam secretly sleeps in the dining room... (more)

The Lost Recipe for Happiness

by Barbara O'Neal

In this sumptuous new novel, Barbara O’Neal offers readers a celebration of food, family, and love as a woman searches for the elusive ingredient we’re all hoping to find…. It’s the opportunity Elena Alvarez has been waiting for–the challenge of running her own kitchen in a world-class restaurant. Haunted by an accident of which she was the lone survivor, Elena knows better than anyone how to survive the odds.... (more)

Comfort Food

by Kate Jacobs

In this smart, delicious novel by the bestselling author of The Friday Night Knitting Club , a celebrity chef shows her friends and family the joy of fulfillment— and manages to spice up her own life at the same time. Shortly before turning the big 5-0, boisterous party planner and Cooking with Gusto! personality Augusta “Gus” Simpson finds herself planning a birthday party she’d rather not—her own. She’s... (more)

Hungry Woman in Paris

by Josefina Lo?pez

A journalist and activist, Canela believes passion is essential to life; but lately passion seems to be in short supply. It has disappeared from her relationship with her fiancé, who is more interested in controlling her than encouraging her. It's absent from her work, where censorship and politics keep important stories from being published. And while her family is full of outspoken individuals, the only one... (more)

Between Courses: A Culinary Love Story

by Karla Clark

Karla Clark's delicious first novel takes on the enduring themes of family, food and love. Filled with dozens of rustic Italian recipes, this funny and touching love story offers a peek into the lives of aspirited Italian-American family of "foodies." Sabina Giovanotti, waitress by day and aunt extra ordinaire by night, is forty, single, and still living above her family's folksy caf in Chicago's Little Italy.... (more)

The Food of Love

by Anthony Capella

In Anthony Capella’s delicious debut novel, Laura, a twentysomething American, is on her first trip to Italy. She;s completely enamored of the art, beauty, and, of course, food that Rome has to offer. Soon she’s enamored of the handsome and charming Tommaso, who tells her he’s a chef at the famed Templi restaurant and begins to woo her with his gastronomic creations. But Tommaso hasen’t been entirely... (more)

The Baker's Apprentice

by Judith Ryan Hendricks

The sequel to Judith Ryan Hendricks' absorbing debut novel, Bread Alone Having found her calling, Wynter Morrison is blissful about her new career in Seattle as a baker -- cherishing the long days spent making bread and the comforting rhythms of the Queen Street Bakery. Still, she struggles with the legacy of her failed marriage and with her new boyfriend Mac's reluctance to share his mysterious past. When... (more)

Five Quarters of the Orange

by Joanne Harris

In her bestselling and critically acclaimed novel Chocolat, Joanne Harris told a lush story of the conflicts between pleasure and repression. Now she delivers her most complex and sophisticated work yet, an unforgettable tale of mothers and daughters, of the past and the present, of resisting and succumbing -- an extraordinary work of fiction lined with darkness and fierce joy. When Framboise Simon returns to a... (more)

Heartburn (Vintage Contemporaries)

by Nora Ephron

Out of analysis and seven months pregnant, cookbook writer Rachel Samstat discovers that her husband is into analysis and an affair and suffers six weeks of intense heartburn. Reprint. 12,500 first printing. NYT.

The Potluck Club: A Novel

by Eva Marie Everson, Linda E. Shepherd

In the small Colorado town of Summit View, a surprising multi-generational mix of women from Grace Church meet once a week to pass a hot dish and to pray. But the Potluck Club, as they call themselves, is a recipe for disaster when they send up enough misinformed prayers to bring down a church. And the funny thing: the more they pray, the more troubles seem to come their way. It isn't until they invite God to the... (more)

Sweet Treats

by Wanda E. Brunstetter

The perfect ingredients for tasty reading, these four stories follow the culinary adventures--and misadventures--of a cooking instructor and three of her students who want to stir up a little romance.

Senora Honeycomb: A NovelFanny Buitrago, Margaret Sayers Peden

Senora Honeycomb: A Novel

by Fanny Buitrago

When her womanizing husband's spendthrift ways force her to to leave her native Colombia to find work in Madrid, Teodora Vencejos takes a job with master chef Dr. Amiel, who gives her a sensuous education in both the culinary and erotic arts.

Recipes For Easy Living

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

One part laughter. Two parts love. Mix together and enjoy! Christmas has come to Valentine, Oklahoma and everybody's got a special wish . . . For thirteen-year-old Corrine , it's really about keeping what she has: a happy life with her aunt Marilee and Papa Tate ; her beloved horses; and an almost boyfriend, Ricky Dale . Now is not the time for the mother who abandoned her to come back into her life.... (more)

Pastries: A Novel of Desserts and Discoveries

Pastries: A Novel of Desserts and Discoveries

by Bharti Kirchner

Sunya is the head baker and owner of Pastries, a warm and comfortable bakery in Seattle, where she trans-forms her fabu-lous cakes and tarts into delicious works of art. Her success is put in jeopardy, however, when a chain bakery threatens to open down the street. To add to her misery, Roger, her hip, Japanese boyfriend has left her, and her mother has just become engaged to a man Sunya detests. All of this... (more)

Bread Alone: A Novel

by Judith Ryan Hendricks

The life of 31-year-old trophy wife Wynter Morrison suddenly changes course when her husband announces one evening that their marriage is over. Emotionally devastated and desperate for a change of scenery, Wyn moves to Seattle where she spends aimless hours at a local bakery, sipping coffee and inhaling the sweet aromas of freshly-made bread. These visits bring back memories of her long-ago apprenticeship at a... (more)

The Wedding Officer: A Novel of Culinary Seduction

The Wedding Officer: A Novel of Culinary Seduction

by Anthony Capella

In the sumptuous tradition of Chocolat and Captain Corelli's Mandolin , and already optioned for a major motion picture, comes a magical tale of romantic passion, culinary delight—and Italy. Captain James Gould arrives in wartime Naples assigned to discourage marriages between British soldiers and their gorgeous Italian girlfriends. But the innocent young officer is soon distracted by an intoxicating young... (more)

Shelfari Book Activity

Tags: culinary fiction

by Joanne Harris

by Sarah-Kate Lynch

by Joanne Harris

by Erica Bauermeister

by Adriana Hunter, Agne?s Desarthe

by Barbara O'Neal

by Kate Jacobs

by Josefina Lo?pez

by Karla Clark

by Anthony Capella

by Judith Ryan Hendricks

by Joanne Harris

by Nora Ephron

by Eva Marie Everson, Linda E. Shepherd

by Wanda E. Brunstetter

by Fanny Buitrago

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

by Bharti Kirchner

by Judith Ryan Hendricks

by Anthony Capella