Sweet and Crunchy Romance: “The Coincidence of Coconut Cake”
Greetings and hallucinations, ladies and gentle-geeks, and welcome. Thank you all for sticking with me.
In looking for words to describe this book, I made a realization: I’m not only a hereditary bookworm, but a wannabe foodie. I’m drawn to books that have food preparation as part of its plotline (see my review of American Food Writing), even including recipes for something in the book itself. In addition to Cleo Coyle’s Coffeehouse Mysteries this week, I also read The Coincidence of Coconut Cake by Amy E. Reichert.
Elizabeth “Lou” Johnson is an excellent chef, working hard to keep Luella’s afloat. She believes she’s balancing her life nicely between work, friends, and her lawyer fiance Devlin. Until she brings a coconut cake for his birthday and gets a surprise: a young intern is in his apartment, wearing the nightgown he had gifted to Lou.
Alastair “Al” Waters is a British transplant to Milwaukee, despairing of Wisconsin winters. He sees Lou by accident before she sees Devlin, catching the smell of the cake, and after, when she runs past in tears. He’s also making a “name” for himself as a restaurant critic, writing under the name of A.W. Wodyski (to give the impression he’s a native). His reviews are described as akin to Dennis Miller, humorously skewering every eatery in the last six months.
Unknown to each other, Al visits Luella’s the night following Lou’s discovery of the intern, reviewing his single visit and terrible meal, when Lou herself admits she isn’t at her best. After “Wodyski’s” review appears, Al meets Lou again when she’s drowning her sorrows. Putting an immediate moratorium on talk of work, she accepts his challenge to show him the best Milwaukee has to offer.
Over the following six months, they spend time together as she takes him on a tour of eateries, breweries, and festivals. Al discovers there are actually good places to eat out, thanks to Lou, even secretly reviewing one while they’re out together. They only see each other when Luella’s is closed, which becomes more often thanks to Wodyski’s review going viral. Eventually, only two of her most loyal customers, Otto and Gertrude Meyers, are left. The Meyers are an older couple from Germany, both escapees from the Nazis, and as deeply in love as when they were married. (No spoilers, but later in the book, make sure you have tissues handy.)
When Al realizes his review is sinking Luella’s, he has a crisis of conscience and it’s too late: he and Lou have already fallen for each other. Now he has to figure out how to tell her without breaking her heart.
This is one of the best kinds of romances, the kind that starts as a genuine friendship, with its fair share of secrets that have the potential to be dangerous, depending on reactions. Surprisingly, Devlin becomes a tame “villain”, trying to make Lou fit into a pre-set mold shaped by the wives of his fellow lawyers, even after she breaks off the engagement. He may have broken her heart, but you come to realize that he tries to break her spirit by belittling her dreams. He thinks he knows best, even when he’s repeatedly told that he’s wrong.
A few additions enhance your appreciation of the book. The author’s dedications at the front (read or re-read after the story’s done) are to Reichert’s Grandma Luella, and her husband and their magnet collection. Of course, there’s a recipe for the famous coconut cake, written in Lou’s voice, down to comment about people stealing pieces before you can get a taste for yourself. The Book Club Discussion Guide is also worth a read, if only to give you alternate ways to see characters and aspects of the plot.
Coincidence is amazingly sweet and worth the read.
Thank you for reading my ramblings, my dears, and I hope to hear from you. If you’d like to recommend a book for me to read and review, or even need me as an editor for your own work, please contact me or leave a comment below.
In the meantime, keep reading, keep writing, and never give up making your own magic. Be well, my dears.