Chocolate: The Consuming Passion is adult funny by Sandra Boynton

Peter Sellers is most famous for playing a simple, some would say dimwitted person. He was also able to work on the adult level by skewing pop culture in Doctor Strange Love and Being There. Dr. Suess wrote and drew on a very simple level that was aimed at children. Suess also has some fabulous art during WWII that worked on a more political, adult level.  Both of these artists crossed my mind while reading Chocolate: The Consuming Passion by Sandra Boynton.

Our children have approximately a dozen and a half Boynton books. She is one of the authors whose books are automatically being saved for future generations. It certainly helps that, until now, all but one of hers were board books that hold up much better over time with young hands.

Chocolate isn’t exclusively a book for adults, but you must be able to read in order to enjoy it. Granted there are dozens of new illustrations featuring her classic characters; but the backbone of the book is the written wit and how she manages to make the simple things funny, dry, educational, sublime and beautiful-with all of it revolving around chocolate.

She wrote a version of this book in 1982. This new edition of Chocolate has been entirely redone from start to finish.  Every page on this book has a laugh to some extent and is fun to read. Part of this pleasure comes from the fact that the pages have different colored backgrounds.  This kept us moving from page to page without thinking about how much I was reading at any point in time.

This is really a book about chocolate. It serves as a primer on the different types of chocolate, how it’s made, why it makes us feel good, how it’s grown and more. You’ll also find several recipes and a phrase book on how to ask for chocolate in foreign countries, including China, Russia, Middle Earth and Klingon.

Chocolate:  The Consuming Passion is a book that fans of Boyton will really like. Our other adult Boynton book, Amazing Cows is one of our go-to books when we need a quick, reliable laugh. Chocolate is also a book for foodies. I don’t know too much about chocolate, other than the fact that my wife has to hide it from me when it’s in the house (true story).  This book is just intricate and detailed enough about chocolate to make foodies pay attention and laugh along the way.