Customer Reviews

Gardens of Delight

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I picked this up in the discount aisle along with a book my book club was going to read. I liked this book! I'm not usually a romance reader but this wasn't too romancey. I liked getting to know all the characters; I think the author did a good job of developing them and I liked how she kind of hopped around from one persons life to another. The chapters are short so you don't have to spend hours with it at a time unless you want to. I will read her other books for plain enjoyment and entertainment, but not necessarily literary challenge or beautiful prose.

This novel is unique in the intermingling of the wide range of characters across multiple age groups. While there are many characters involved, each is independently developed and easy to to keep track of.

I feel like I owe my brain an apology for exposing it to this book....ALL the characters are reprehensible--manipulative, dishonest, judgmental, incapable of appropriate communications, and that's when they are not being deliberately cruel to each other or so thick they cannot recognize they are being manipulated. Do yourself a favor--skip this one, and pick up a Marian Keyes novel.

A garden like its creator should have its secrets and surprises. It should contain delights within delights and paths that make you want to follow them, even though they may not lead you anywhere in particular. On the other hand they may lead you somewhere wonderfully unexpected.
This novel is about friendship, the love of gardens and gardening, and the love of falling in love.
Lucy, Helen, Mac, Conrad, Hunter, Savannah, Orlando, and their group of gardening friends all go through a series of life altering moments when they fly to Italy to visit Lake Como and the wonderful gardens that the tour guide promises.
Lucy will see her estranged father and her stepmother while Helen will find out that her powerful hubby Hunter is sleeping with her best friend. Conrad will realize that Mac is not his uncle but his father, and Orlando after splitting up with hateful and impossible Savannah, will realize that the love of his life is and always has been Lucy only Lucy will have her heart set on the sexy Italian pianist Alessio.
An engaging and friendly novel that will entertain you with its well painted cameo characters.