About the Book:
From bestselling Romanian author, this fantastical novel mixes elements of magic and folklore to create a dark and playful tale that transverses Europe at the turn of the 18th century.
An atmospheric magical tale based on real historical events and Romanian culinary recipes; The Book of Perilous Dishes is a page-turning historical fantasy that will follow readers long after they close the book.
Bucharest, 1798. A slave-cook lives in Bucharest, sought after by everyone. His sublime cooking satisfies even the sophisticated tastes of the Prince, who lays claim to him, whisking him away to the Palace. However, no one knows that the cook has in his possession a witch’s recipe book, the Book of Perilous Dishes. His food can bring about damaging sincerity, forgetfulness, the gift of prediction, or hysterical laughter. And the rightful owner of this book is fourteen-year-old Pâtca, an adolescent initiated in the occult arts. Pâtca comes to Bucharest, to her uncle, Cuviosu Zaval, to recover this book, but she finds him dead, murdered, and the Book of Perilous Dishes has disappeared without a trace. All that Zaval has left her is a strange map…
The Book of Perilous Dishes follows the story of Pâtca, who uses her powers to avenge the death of her uncle and retrieve a magical recipe book left in his keeping which has been stolen by Silica the cook. Travelling from Romania to France and on to Germany to do so, Pâtca’s family’s true past and powers are revealed, as is her connection to Silica the cook…
This is both a historical novel and a tale of the fantastic. The magical order of the Satorines bring into the story their own specific words and names, drawing on the heritage of ancient Rome. For example, Tutilina, a minor goddess of the fields in ancient times, here becomes the name of a learned witch, while Sator himself, the supreme being whose energies the Satorines seek to harness, takes his name from another Roman deity, Sator the sower or creator. It is also, as might be guessed from the title, a story about cooking. No less than twenty-one recipes are presented in the course of the story, recipes for perilous dishes with magical qualities. Some have been passed down through the centuries in Romanian tradition while others Doina Ruşti has dug out of old Latin texts, hence their Latin names. Some, she assures me, are still being made and are even used in the modern pharmaceutical industry…
My Thoughts:
As a Romanian book, I learnt quite a lot about Romanian culture during the 18th & 19th centuries, an area of history I’ve not heard much about at all!
The storytelling was similar to that of a fairytale or folktale, as was the plot. Quite fantastical with a healthy dose of magic.
By the second half of the book I was really quite invested in the (many) characters and the ending was full of twists and surprises.
Overall it was an interesting and very different story to my usual reads! Go with the flow with this one, don’t question too much, and enjoy the magic! Not sure I’ll be trying any of the (perilous) recipes though…
The Author:
Doina Rusti is among the most important contemporary Romanian writers and is widely appreciated for the epic force, originality, and erudition of her novels. Award winning and translated into many languages, she has written ten novels, including The Phantom in the Mill (2008), The Phanariot Manuscript (2015), and The Book of Perilous Dishes (2017). Doina lives in Bucharest and is a university professor and screenwriter.
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