Capella, Anthony 1963(?)–

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Capella, Anthony 1963(?)–

PERSONAL: Born c. 1963; married; children: three. Education: Attended Oxford University.

ADDRESSES: Home—London, England. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Viking/Penguin Group, 375 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014.

CAREER: Former free-range pig farmer.

WRITINGS:

The Food of Love (novel), Viking (New York, NY), 2004.

ADAPTATIONS: The Food of Love was optioned for film production.

SIDELIGHTS: Anthony Capella's love of Italy and its cuisine led him to write a debut novel in which Italian food plays a starring role. A Publishers Weekly contributor wrote that "sophisticated gourmets will realize right away that Capella's no poseur (he quotes Marcella Hazan, for starters)." The Food of Love is a modern take on Edmund Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac. Bruno is a shy and homely chef who falls in love with Laura Patterson over a period of months as he helps a friend seduce her with fine food.

Laura, an American studying in Rome, decides that she is through with Italian men until a friend tells her to hold out for a chef, because they are good with their hands. Bruno's Vespa-riding friend, the waiter Tommaso, is a cad who lusts after the American college student with "honey-colored skin and freckles like orange-red flakes of chile." He convinces Bruno to cook the treats with which he will tempt Laura's substantial appetite. Bruno is more than up to the task; he is the chef at Templi, a restaurant so fine that it is necessary to make reservations three months in advance in order to dine there.

Bruno agrees to assist in the seduction by cooking a meal which Tommaso retrieves course by course for Laura. Food scenes turn into sex scenes, which turn into food and sex scenes. Laura is overcome by the feast and tells her friends of Tommaso's great skill in the kitchen. When a dinner party for six is arranged, Bruno lowers his dishes in a bucket from which Tommaso retrieves them. They include a dark chocolate tartufo that heightens the passions of the couples. By now, Bruno, who has never had a girlfriend, has fallen in love with Laura himself, and the remainder of the story reveals how he acts on his feelings.

Booklist reviewer Mark Knoblauch felt that "foodies" will enjoy sections of The Food of Love in which Capella describes "quasi-military life in the tyrannically run kitchen and snooty dining room of a Michelin-starred eatery run by a ruthless chef." A Kirkus Reviews contributor called the story "a nice romp through the back alleys of the Eternal City, all in a lighthearted tone more farce than tragedy," while New York Times Book Review critic Liesl Schillinger dubbed The Food of Love, a "well-fashioned fable."