Orion (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd ) Botanist's Daughter

Bought this for our book club as I thought it would be a light summer read while offering something to discuss.Sadly I was wrong. As soon as I started it I knew I was in trouble. The thing I found most irritating was the dialogue which doesn't ring true; it is extremely forced and littered with "ye olde fashioned words" thesaurus finds. If you like books by authors (and popular ones at that so good on them!) like Danielle Steele you'll probably enjoy this - it has a beginning, middle and end, moves at pace and no thinking on the reader's part is required. I read it on a long flight in one sitting.On the other hand, if you love books like Love is Blind by William Boyd (best book I read this year) you'll want to run a mile from The Botanist's Daughter.

I bought a paperback copy of this to give my daughter at xmas but decided to get it on my kindle and read it first. It was such a disappointment that the paperback is going straight to the charity shop. The story is a good one but the writing is packed with cliches and the dialogue unbelievable. I am permanently deleting it on my kindle - something I rarely do.

Well, this book proved the old adage!It should have been the perfect light read: Botanical art, Kew Gardens, Cornwall...but it just fell flat. The characters were not developed and therefore I couldn't invest in them at all. They all seemed soppy and slightly annoying to be honest. There is no build-up whatsoever in the main romantic relationship. It is so neglected it 's actually amusing in a cringey way. The plot could have been so much more, but the whole book just felt rushed and half-baked.I was also left with an uncomfortable overriding sense that this was a poor imitation of Kate Morton's 'The Forgotten Garden'. I couldn't shake the awareness that this was trying to emulate that book from the start. Sadly it only serves to highlight the failings of this attempt.I have never given up on a book yet, but I am aware that I only stuck with this because we had gone into Coronavirus lockdown and time was not an issue.One positive is the cover art. It's a very pretty book, but it's beauty is definitely only skin deep.

Spanning one-and-a-half centuries and over ten thousand miles, this story encompasses the preoccupations of obsessional plant collectors, who undertake life-threatening adventures to fulfil their passions, and a painstaking hunt to research family connections and solve a problem spanning four generations.It is quite a page-turner and well-written, even though on at least two occasions the reader is required to suspend disbelief beyond all reason, and accept virtually impossible anomalies. However, I’m glad I accepted the challenge, as I was overall entertained and intrigued by this novel.

If you like improbable stories and mushy romance you are in for a treat. It was all I could do to struggle to the inevitable conclusion.