The Hot Sauce Madness Love Burn Suite is a book of poems that revolves around the beloved and sometimes notorious culture of hot sauce and hot peppers. Its 814 rhyming couplets delve deeply into that rich and addicting world, whether they focus on peppers' flavor, pain, linguistics, or history. Come take a bite out of these verses, and see if you can handle the heat. 1912: pharmacist Wilbur Lincoln Scoville first measured the "heat" of peppers (the word's in quotes because there's no actual heat in this equation, just spiciness, which hoodwinks our bodies into thinking physical flames are licking our tongues, throat, lips). Chilies aren't caliente, which implies heat from an actual fire, but picante, the word we use for heat that arises from spice.