I was recommended Butter by Asako Yuzuki by my friend Pam and spent November reading it in every spare minute I had. It should come with the health warning that you will eat more when you are reading this book.

I have never known anyone to write about food the way she does. You really can taste it. The textures, smells and mouthfeels are so perfectly described that you cannot help go and do some impromptu baking when you put it down between chapters. The protagonist puts on ten kilos in the course of the story, and whilst I managed to avoid that whilst reading it, it is an excellent counter to a culture of grabbing tasteless food on the go to eat alone, when you could be learning, experimenting and creating joyful food to eat with others.

Manako Kajii however, had other things in mind when cooking for others, and is in prison for the serial murders of lonely businessmen whom she has poisoned with her creations. The lonely, meal for one, workaholic journalist Rika Machida is on the hunt for the real woman behind the legend that Kajii has become and befriends her by visiting her in prison to try to get the scoop of her career. She soon finds herself sucked into Kajii’s world and on a hunt across the supermarkets of Tokyo for the perfect butter amidst a butter shortage.

By the time Rika journeys to Kajii’s hometown of dairy farms with her best friend Reiko to meet Kajii’s family and the people she grew up with, she has become entirely sucked into the serial killer’s world, is losing her sense of self and having to confront her own past.

This is so utterly different from anything that I have read before that I was totally captivated by it and have been recommending it to everyone. All the more given it is based on a true story of ‘The Konkatsu killer’. It truly is a delicious read.