Customer Reviews

Heartbreak Cafe

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Penelope Stokes is a fine writer, and I have enjoyed a number of her books. With Heartbreak Cafe, she has written the best of the lot. This one will give you moments of deep thought and touch you in places you will remember for a long time. The characters are fully developed and so very human you will wish you could sit down with them over a cup of coffee at the cafe. You will laugh with them and cry with them and share their struggles with the emotions of living. You just can't help liking them, which is more than can be said for lots of current characters in today's best sellers.
In some of her earlier books, Stokes leaned heavily on what I believe is called "Christian themes". There is nothing wrong with that if you like to read such stories. The difference I found in Heartbreak Cafe is that she has woven goodness and honesty and "Christian Values" into this book without preaching. And that is the mark of an author who is approaching the heights of the art of good writing. Good job, Miss Penny, write on.

Fans of Adriana Trigiani's Big Stone Gap novels should devour this tasty and soulful Southern fare. There's humor and great local color in Stokes's portrayal of this small Mississippi town, where a diner called the Heartbreak Cafe is right at home with the Curl Up and Dye Beauty Parlor. But there are more serious themes, too: the betrayal of love. The delicate dance of race relations. The good and the bad of a small town where your grade-school nickname sticks to you for life -- even if it's Fart Unger. How to get up and go on when life knocks you flat. 50-year-old Dell Haley is down-to-earth and unpretentious, yet insightful. The first person point of view gets you inside her skin and it's a comfortable place to be. Nobody would blame her if she chose to "curl and up die" after what has happened to her, but instead she grows in new ways, helped by a group of diner patrons and workers who become like family. Some great characters among them: Scratch, a black man on the run from something, whom Dell has to decide to trust; loony, lusty nursing-home fugitive Purdy Overstreet; and the intriguing, gone-to-seed beauty queen turned brooding writer, Peach Rondell. I'm looking forward to seeing more of her in the forthcoming sequel The Book of Peach.

Heartbreak Cafe is an enjoyable book despite a few cliched characters and a bit of contriving in the end. The majority of the characters are believable and delightful, and the setting is well written. The recipes included are good and are the type one would expect to be used by the protagonist. I would have given it 3 and 1/2 stars if possible. It's not great literature but is worth the purchase price.

I have red another book by Ms. Stokes and it was really good. I purhcased this one, read it and it was wonderful too. I would recommend this author to anyone who loves a great story.

I've always enjoyed Penelope Stoke's books, especially Blue Boodle Club. Yet this book is a toss up from the perspective that the story content is good and had a good ending. Yet, why did the author choose to slip in the relationship between Brenda and another woman? Was that really necessary? I would like to hear the author's response to this question. Friendship, hard work, overcoming grief are all great traits of this story, but it still left a sour taste in my stomach...for those that care. Not recommended for church libraries.