Nectar: A Novel of Temptation [Hardcover]

Lily Prior (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 18, 2002

Ramona Drottoveo, an albino with unusual looks, is a chambermaid at a lush Italian estate, La Casa. Further distinguished by the intoxicating scent she exudes, Ramona effortlessly bewitches all men, who are driven into an erotic frenzy each time they inhale her aroma. Ramona -- haughty and misguided -- eagerly satisfies their inexhaustible lust, while the women at the estate scold and despise her.

Ramona's life changes when she marries a sweet beekeeper, a victim of her enchantment. But the marriage doesn't last long: the beekeeper dies after discovering his bride with a new lover on their wedding day. When the beekeeper's body disappears, the superstitious villagers blame Ramona and her lover and exile the couple from the estate to the neighboring city of Naples. The story follows Ramona through her tragicomic misadventures in Naples, where her life is transformed once again. by the birth of an unwanted daughter, Blandina, who "steals" Ramona's scent, depriving her mother of her only asset in life. No longer able to seduce men into blind submission, Ramona returns humbly to La Casa to an unexpected welcome -- and revenge.

A hilarious and naughty celebration of the senses and the strange places they can lead us, Nectar is a wildly entertaining fable on the mystery and cruelty of sexual attraction and the frivolous nature of divine justice.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

To visualize Prior's rambunctious novel, imagine a grand, erotic opera buffa, bursting with outsized passion and populated by 99 fancifully named and generally grotesque characters, including a disappearing corpse and his vengeful ghost, a love-starved humpback and the protagonist, a femme fatale in every sense of the word. The temptress is fat, albino Ramona Drottoveo, whose repulsive appearance (her skin is a violent shade of pink, as are her piggy eyes) is no deterrent to the tumescent reaction of any man who gets close enough to inhale the maddening sexual aroma she exudes. Vain, selfish and monumentally stupid, Ramona takes great delight in the hordes of aroused men she attracts. The elderly Signor of la Casa, where she works as a chambermaid, regularly has his way with her, but Ramona decides to marry the lowly beekeeper on the estate so she can quit her job and loaf. The day after her wedding, however, she is surprised with the beekeeper's new assistant, Rinaldo Buffi, a veritable Adonis, inspiring her cuckolded husband to commit suicide. Cast out from la Casa, Ramona and Rinaldo go to Naples, where further adventures await the seductive antiheroine. Prior (La Cucina) propels this larky but dark tale with sensuous descriptions of opulent banquets, hurly-burly street scenes, horrendous natural disasters and providential encounters. Yet the narrative seems less constructed than jerry-built; whenever the plot drives into a corner, magical intervention occurs. Despite its farcical tone, this Technicolor fairy tale is based on the lowest and most venal aspects of human nature, and one may tire of Ramona long before she gets her well-deserved comeuppance.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Ramona Drottoveo is a haughty, unsightly albino woman whose sole asset is her intoxicating and magical aroma. She works as a chambermaid at a luxurious Italian country estate where men desire her and she readily satiates their lust. In an act of defiance, she marries the one man who resisted her, the quiet beekeeper. But when he catches her with another man on their wedding day, he kills himself. When the beekeeper's body disappears and strange events befall the estate, the townspeople blame Ramona and her lover. Exiled, they end up in Naples, where Ramona continues to use her sexually charged aroma to get what she wants. However, when she conceives and has a child, Ramona's smell vanishes. Without money, a lover, or her spellbinding scent, Ramona humbly returns to the country estate with her daughter in tow to a surprising response and her ultimate fate. Following La Cucina (2000), Prior once again explores the power of the senses in a lush and bawdy tale of sex, desire, and the certainty of retribution. Carolyn Kubisz
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Ecco; 1st edition (June 18, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0066212596
• ISBN-13: 978-0066212593
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,090,684 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't bother., May 20, 2005

By 

Outi (Finland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nectar: A Novel of Temptation (Paperback)

Well, I have to say I did read this book even after i realised it isn't a particularily good one, but it was more of a habit than of interest. There's only one thing to say: in this book's storyline there are events happening after one another, but there's no actual STORY. Honestly. It takes more than coming up with "funny" things your main character could do to make a good, or even a descent novel.

Pardon my english, bit rusty at the moment.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Chaucer Extra Lite, October 26, 2003

By 

D. Cloyce Smith (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Nectar: A Novel of Temptation (Paperback)

This imaginative and undemanding comedy relates the rise and fall of Ramona Drotteveo, a country chambermaid whose scent turns men into obsessive fools and women into jealous enemies. A perfidious coquette, Ramona keeps lovers only as long as they are able to give her exactly what she desires--which is seldom longer than a day. Her misdeeds result in exile to Naples, where she schemes to become a world-class opera diva--in spite of her ear-shattering vocal limitations. Eventually, her scent (like beauty) vanishes, and she loses her primacy to the daughter she despises.

In spite of its numerous sexual references and innuendoes, "Nectar" is more impish than pornographic. The story goes down easily and, depending on how much one appreciates sheer silliness, it is often quite funny--although, admittedly, it rarely transcends the genre of "guilty pleasure." In fact, it's not an easy book to categorize: unlike a fable or fairy tale, it has no moral; if it is meant as a satire, the object of ridicule (beauty? fashion? narcissism?) is lost on me. Instead, the book seems a blend of camp and ribaldry--Chaucer Extra Lite, if you will.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fun, fairy tale-like tale, told lushly, if luciviously, October 13, 2002

By 

Stephen Richmond "Librarian/Teacher/Reader an... (Newton, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Nectar: A Novel of Temptation (Hardcover)

A quick entirely diverting read, full of the rich prose Lily Prior does so well. Although more concerned with smell than with taste, as in her first novel, LA CUCINA, she does include a rather scrumptious feast of words in a chapter or two. Sensation is everything here and the sparkling and lively tale is amazingly delicious, delectable, and drolly naughty. Ramona, our decidedly unpleasant heroine, delights even as she disgusts. Prior and her sister novelists Laura Esquivel and Joanne Harris are giving the old guard magic realists a true challenge with each new work. This is great escapist fiction in a time we need more fantasy and romance.