Joanne Harris

25 years since Chocolat was published, Joanne Harris has written Vianne, the prequel to her story about itinerant traveller Vianne Rocher. The book begins on 22nd July 1993 with Vianne’s reflection, having scattered her mother’s ashes in New York on 4th July, that aged 21, she is independent and free to make her own life choices.

Vianne chooses Marseille but her mother’s pervasive voice, imprinted on her childhood memories of moving from place to place, warns her not to put down roots and keep following the mercurial winds. She has, however, inherited her mother’s deep spirituality and proficiency with Tarot cards, which give her second sight, allowing her to read and understand those around her.

Vianne is drawn to an old-fashioned bistrot, La Bonne Mère, owned by widower Louis Martin, who still grieves the death of his wife, Margot, nearly twenty years ago. Given a job and a room, Vianne works her magic reproducing the recipes from Margot’s cookbook and the intoxicating dishes revitalise Louis and reawakens his joy of life. The rich descriptions of the flavours, textures and smells of each dish Harris brilliantly describes in mouth-watering detail throughout the book.

As Vianne inveigles herself into the traditional French tight-knit community, we understand what it is like to be an outsider and how the local people are wary of any change that may impact their lives. Vianne uses her magic to read people’s aura, understand their secret worries and fears, to make them happier. On finding old newspaper cuttings about a kidnapped baby in her dead mother’s things, she recognises why her mother was fearful of losing her as a child and the terror which dogged her symbolised by the spectre of the ‘Man in Black’, an oppressive figure of authority which drove them onwards, was an expression of her guilt. Having made friends and been welcomed into the community, her mother’s insinuating voice drives her to move on and reject her own happiness. It is only when her friend brings her back that she realises that her freedom is still curtailed by her mother and she finds her own inner strength and happiness.

Harris’s website lists one of her hobbies as ‘quiet subversion of the system’, that she was born in a sweetshop, dreams in colour, sound and scent, and has a form of synaesthesia which means that she experiences certain colours as scents. The recipient of many awards, she became an MBE in 2013 and an OBE in 2022. Harris believes that our emotional response to a taste or a smell can act upon us at a very powerful, subconscious level and is also a very useful indicator of personality and attitude to life. Vianne, like Chocolat, is transformative.