[1] The book tells two separate but related tales: first, the romance between Nacib Saad, a respectable bar owner of Syrian origin, and his new cook Gabriela, an innocent and captivating migrant worker from the impoverished interior.

The second part to this story is about the political struggle between the seasoned cacao plantation owners, with the powerful Bastos clan in pole position, and the forces of modernization, in the person of Mundinho Falcão, a wealthy young man from Rio de Janeiro.

It can be read simultaneously as an unusual, charming love story, a description of the political and social forces at work in 1920s Brazil, a somewhat satirical depiction of Latin American aspirations to "modernity", and a celebration of the local culture and pleasures of Bahia.

[1] The colonels run the local governing administration of both major political parties, thus control all decisionmaking and with violence if necessary hold on to their large estates that supply the means upon which everything and everyone depends.

They are the plutocratic rulers of what could be called a purely feudal society, aided by complicated system of allegiances built upon mutual interest, reciprocal favors and kinship.