This book was a sad, unoriginal mish mash of “Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood,” “When Katie Wakes,” “Persian Pickle Club,” blah blah blah.

Absolutely nothing original about this book. If you’ve read more than one book about a group of women supporting each other, then you’ve pretty much read this book.

Rating: 2 / 5

I think the previous reviews give the preface of the book so I will pass on adding to that. I was at Costco and picked up Julia’s Chocolate by Cathy Lamb while getting books for my 17-year-old daughter to read. I do on occasion, pick up a book thinking I will read it then get it home and get started and put it down to never pick it up again. This was not the case with this book. I think it has been years since I finished a book within a week from start to finish. Even my daughter could not believe she was seeing me sit and read on a consistent basis and commented today when I finished the book that she hasn’t seen me do that as long as she could remember when it comes to reading a fictional story. I would definitely put Cathy Lamb in the same class as Laurie Notaro on her writing ability and humorous style. I think all of us as women can relate to having secrets in our lives and when we find a friendship or friendships that we can be open and honest about, we become protective of them just as each of these fictional characters did. Cathy was able to use who and what we are as women to deal with some very taboo issues but keep it funny enough to not be dark.

I live just West of Cathy in Hillsboro, Oregon and love that she uses Oregon and Portland as a backdrop, the only place in the world I want to call home.

Her next book cannot be released soon enough for me but I have it pre-ordered so as soon as it is released, I will have it.

Rating: 5 / 5

I picked this book up as an uncorrected proof from a small used bookstore’s outdoor $1 rack last fall, since Julia is my niece’s name and chocolate is always an interesting topic as a metaphor in fiction. Opening the book at random to determine whether there was a dollar’s worth of good reading inside, I caught glimpse of a number of swear words, lots of references to women’s sexual organs, and food. How bad could it be? It certainly didn’t seem dull. I bought it.

Sadly, the first thirty pages or so were dull. It took me a while to get used to the curious writing style of vivid imagery mixed with very flat prose, and the sad, cryptic and rather dreary early pages did not seem to promise a whole lot. However, once I finally got a little further into it, and got to know the very real and very dynamic characters, it took on a life of its own.

Most women will probably find something or someone to identify with in this book, but that isn’t why I found it interesting. I liked how communal it was…how female friendships, small towns, churches and common interests create groups that exist as communities, even in spite of themselves; and how we all wind up engaged in other people’s lives, even if we don’t mean to. Characters range from stock drunk to reclusive psychic, and if you let yourself into the libertine mindset of Aunt Lydia, one of the main characters, and the one who speaks the most sense, if you ask me, you don’t find them too predictable.

Lsmb’s in-your-face style mitigates some of the triteness of the storyline, and saves the whole thing from being just a romance with a lot of chocolatemaking in it. Giving yourself over to Vagina Appreciation Night, as the core group of characters do, isn’t a bad thing, and might lead to some interesting developments, and so I give the book 4 stars, mainly because I think more people need to appreciate their vaginas with the same gusto as these ladies.
Rating: 4 / 5