Cooking for Picasso

June 27, 2016
In 1936, Céline’s grandmother Ondine Belange was a beautiful 17-year-old girl living in a tiny village in the south of France. The daughter of café owners, Ondine is sent to cook for a mysterious man who has rented a villa in Juan-les-Pins. When the temperamental 54-year-old turns out to be Pablo Picasso, known to have intense love affairs, Ondine’s life (and ultimately Céline’s) is changed forever, especially once she begins posing for him. In the modern day, Céline has come to France under the guise of taking a cooking class to search for the painting that her mother has told her Picasso gave her grandmother. She enlists the help of a celebrity chef, Gil Halliwell, to look for the painting that she is sure holds the key not only to her past but her future. The novel alternates between Ondine’s encounters with Picasso and the repercussions of that brief affair, and Céline’s adventures with cooking, love, and history along the Mediterranean. Both plot lines include a romance—one too sensationalized and one that climaxes without enough buildup. The real meat in this novel is the details (both real and imagined) of Picasso’s fascinating life.

Mozhan Marno narrates this dual-time-period audiobook, which begins with a reimagining of Pablo Picasso's brief stay in the French coastal town of Juan-les-Pins in 1939. In this account, 17-year-old Ondine becomes the artist's cook and eventually his model. In contemporary times, American-born Celine visits France in hopes of finding a hidden painting it is thought Picasso gave to her late grandmother. Marno's impeccable accents bring authenticity to the women's stories, which focus on both culinary skills and love. She sympathetically conveys Ondine's and Celine's very different emotional circumstances: Ondine dreams of escaping her parents' expectations, and Celine is worried about her mother's failing health. Humor lightens the mood, making this romance cum mystery--full of art, family bickering, and of course, fabulous food--fully enjoyable. C.B.L. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine