The Discovery of Chocolate: A Novel - Tapa dura

A wonderfully inventive and entertaining journey through time and the history of chocolate!

The Discovery of Chocolate is a fabulous tale, as rich and exotic as the gorgeous creation that Diego de Godoy first discovers when he arrives in Mexico with Cortes and his conquistadors.

Diego arrives in the New World in search of treasure. What he finds is love, and chocolate, and an elixir of life. Separated from his lover, he must wander the world, and the centuries, in search of the fulfillment that he first knew in Mexico.

In a series of dramatic episodes that are evocative, witty and thought-provoking, from revolutionary Paris to Freud’s Vienna, Fry’s Bristol and Hershey’s Pittsburgh, Diego and his ever-faithful greyhound, Pedro, seek the perfection of chocolate and the meaning of life.

When Diego de Godoy leaves his native Seville and takes a ship for the New World, he is hoping to find a treasure that will make him worthy of the hand in marriage of the beautiful Isabella de Quintallina.

He finds more than he bargained for.

Fighting alongside Cortes and his conquistadors Diego falls in love with a Mexican woman and she initiates him into the sensuous secret of chocolate.

From the moment he is separated from his lover, however, Diego and his ever-faithful greyhound Pedro are destined to wander throughout the world and down the centuries in search of the fulfilment they knew for that brief time, seeking the perfection of chocolate and the meaning of life.

Full of excitement, humour and not a little sadness, the drama of Diego's quest is played out against a background of great cities, by a cast of richly colourful characters, including the Marquis de Sade and Sigmund Freud, to name but two.

'The Discovery of Chocolate' is a fabulous delight, as rich and exotic as the luxurious confections that Diego himself creates.