This is one of those books that I picked using my favourite technique: Like the cover? Read what’s on the back. Like that? Read the first paragraph. Like that? I’m getting it.
Izzy is about to turn 41, which is bad enough on its own but she has more reason than most to avoid this birthday. When her mother turned 41, she did not make it to the end of the day. As Izzy’s birthday progresses, her father arrives to help her celebrate this milestone, and so does her sister Ellie, who also brings her daughter
Rachel. Izzy and Ellie are close, which makes it even harder when Izzy suspects that her sister is exhibiting the same symptoms of mental illness that they saw in their mother. Then again, maybe she just exaggerates things a little. Mr a lot. Who is to say what the truth is anyway?
The first thing I liked about this novel is that although the girls’ mother was clearly unstable and as a result their childhoods fraught with tensions that in an ideal world kids wouldn’t have to bear, they’re not overwhelmed by their history. She was still a great mother most of the time and they’re getting on with life just like real people have to, with maybe the odd “bomb” going off when they get together. And we all know what that’s like, don’t we?
The second thing I liked was that it is short. I read it one rainy weekend day and still had time to walk the dog and do the laundry. Sometimes a girl just needs that sort of a book.
The third thing is that it had at least four pages to blub through, which is absolutely essential with this kind of read. The girls’ father, a man with the patience of a saint, is such a great character that when he got sad, so did I.
Which brings me to the fourth thing I liked about Crazy As Chocolate: it has a happy ending. Not sugary dairy-milk happy just deliciously, darkly happy. The title, by the way, comes from a poem by Anne Sexton, called Live. “Even crazy, I’m as nice as a chocolate bar.”
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