In Fraise et Chocolat, Aurélia Aurita transforms the beginning of her relationship with fellow comics artist Frédéric Boilet into a frank autobiographical account of love, sex and artistic discovery. Living in Tokyo, Chenda encounters Frédéric and the two rapidly become lovers. The book follows the developing relationship through conversations, everyday encounters, sexual experiments, moments of embarrassment and uncertainty, and the exhilaration of discovering a like-minded person.

The book’s most striking feature is its perspective. Aurita places her own female experience of desire at the heart of the narrative, neither disguising nor apologising for it. Sex is explicit, but it is also ordinary – pleasurable, funny, awkward, affectionate, and sometimes confusing. The spontaneous drawing style reinforces the book’s diary-like quality. Simplified, often caricatural figures are combined with expressive bodies and faces, while Aurita’s willingness to depict herself unflatteringly provides both humour and a degree of critical distance from the autobiographical content.

The title, Strawberry and Chocolate, mirrors the book’s mixture of sensuality and playfulness. Fraise and Chocolat being the affectionate names of the two lovers, suggesting sweetness, appetite and physical pleasure. The result is a sensitive and moving combination of erotic memoir, love story and coming-of-age narrative.

We have included here the first forty or so pages of Fraise et Chocolat 1 – buy the book for the whole story.

Fraise et Chocolat 1 is published by Les Impressions Nouvelles, Paris. It has been translated into Italian, Spanish and Dutch, but not so far into English.