By Bread Alone

September 20, 2004
As the crust of a sourdough boule protects the tenderness within, so it is with artisanal baker Esme Stack, who privately nurses a grieving heart while wittily coping with crises involving her dour father-in-law, Henry; the specter of her beloved, recently deceased Granny Mac; and an evil goat. Esme, her husband, Pog, and their four-year-old, Rory, have left their glam London life and moved to the Suffolk countryside after a tragedy so terrible it is long unnamed. Bread provides much subject matter and metaphor, especially with the reappearance of Esme's first lover, a sexy French artisanal baker. Lynch lets the dough of her story rise slowly, allowing the dread to build even amid the gossipy fun. Nestling a tragedy inside a comedy is a brave feat, and New Zealander Lynch (Blessed Are the Cheesemakers
) almost pulls it off. Alas, the plot resolution centers on improbable actions by Charlie Edmonds, Esme's gay male best friend, and Ridgely Watson, the son of Esme's female best friend, who exists offstage until he appears to commit a final, dramatic and deeply unwise act. Lynch then resolves the story in a crescendo of moralizing, weeping and redemption. Like one of the breads Esme bakes, the story stays in the oven a little too long—it's not perfect, but it's still good.

September 15, 2004
Esme, a magazine editor turned mom, hasn't baked a loaf of her famous sourdough bread since falling into a deep depression a month ago. Her husband and young son worry but do not realize that the daily bread-making ritual stems from the passionate first love of a baker in France many years ago. The day that Esme decides to snap out of it, the long-lost baker suddenly shows up in London to rekindle the romance. Will she choose him and escape the pain that haunts her at home? Too many secondary characters and dangling plot lines make it difficult to focus on the main characters and story. The sad events of the recent past are not revealed until the end but are constantly referred to throughout, so that readers wonder if they missed a chapter early on. When the details are finally revealed, there is not enough time left to care. For larger fiction collections or where Lynch's first novel (Blessed Are the Cheesemakers) was well received. Rebecca Vnuk, Elmhurst P.L., IL

Copyright 2004 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2004
This second novel is an aromatic ode to the carbohydrate and a poignant tale of loves and lives lost and regained. Esme learned to make her signature sourdough bread under the romantic tutelage of Louis while on holiday in France. Their tumultuous love affair ends in betrayal, and brokenhearted Esme retreats to England. Years later, Esme frantically flees London. She has been replaced at her glamorous editing job by a backstabbing employee and suffered an unexplained family tragedy. Living like country gentry in a peculiarly constructed farmhouse with dysfunctional farm animals, her father-in-law, and her own grandmother, Granny Mac, Esme hopes to bring back her family's absent joy. With the sage and saucy advice of her Scottish granny, Esme realizes she must revisit her painful past to overcome her pain-filled present. The story slides easily between Esme's budding first romance with Louis and her current gloomy situation. A tearjerker in every sense of the word, so readers will laugh and cry along with Esme as she rediscovers her bread and strength. Highly recommended.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2004, American Library Association.)