Five Quarters of the Orange (2001) by Joanne Harris

🍊 My first introduction to Joanne Harris was Chocolat; I knew I have started that book years ago, but couldn't remember whether I've ever finished it. I think not. Either because it's a borrowed book, and I have to return it before I have finished; or it must've been sold while I was reading (I ran an online second-hand book store back then). Anyway, Five Quarters of the Orange, then, became my first book of Joanne Harris which I did finish. It's a big relieve when I had finished it; it's not a bad one, just that I was not in the right mental state to give it a proper credit. It's a complex story of dark secrets, a childish-folly-turns tragedy, acceptance, revelation, and resilience.

🍊 Framboise Simon was sixty years old widow when she returned to her childhood home in a small village on the banks of the Loire. She owns a creperie, serving delicious food she loves to cook; mostly recreating her late mother's dishes from the recipe scrapbook Framboise inherited from her. Although she was born in the village, the villagers thought Framboise a stranger, because she does not dare to use her own name, Dartigen. Framboise Dartigen was only nine years old when she left the village after a terrible tragedy during the German Occupation in the 1940s. This, then, is an intermingled mixture of Framboise's past and present life; how the past affected her present, and how the present helps her to be free from the haunting past. 

🍊 Framboise's childhood is a troubled one. She lived with her widowed mother Mirabelle Dartigen, brother Cassis, and sister Reine-Claude. Mirabelle was a hard woman, who's often mean and cruel to her own children, although she loved them. Her life seemed to be full of hatred and bitterness, and she poured it to her children, whom in turn, hated her too. She's often a victim of splitting headache, which was usually started with smelling non-existing oranges - a fruit she always hated. The title derived from Framboise's idea to trigger the headache on her mother, so that she and her siblings could be on their own; by secretly slicing a tiny sliver of orange - the fifth of the supposedly quarters - to be placed near her mother's pillow. Once she inhaled it, she'd have another spell, and off the children would go. Go where?

🍊 It's during this German Occupation that a handsome German officer who speaks a perfect French called Tomas Leibniz introduced himself to the children. They instantly took to him, but especially Framboise, who worshipped him. Their friendship grew bigger; but unfortunately, also, their risk. It finally led to the tragedy. But Framboise did not quite understand that at that time, and it was now, while browsing through her mother's recipe book, was written snatches of her mother's thoughts, did Framboise finally (almost) fully understood what had had happened.

🍊 Maybe if I had read this five years ago, I would have appreciated it more. Now, it distressed me a little. I was troubled with how Framboise treated her mother - though I could see why. The only person I could like in this book is Paul. I admired his support and friendship for Framboise, and I liked how it all ended. It was a troubling book, but still worth reading, if nothing else, for its beautiful writing.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐