The French Gardener

The French Gardener

Santa Montefiore

5 out of 5

Seldom does a book come a long that you can just feel your body relax and you just melt away into the story. For me, this summer, The French Gardener did just that.

This book spins two tales that are brought together by a single French gardener and his story of love that could not be and a garden that hold the secret that is slowly told through a scrapbook read by a woman that has a similar story but is not the intended recipient. That may sound confusing but this gentle paced story unfolds in a way that you see the beauty but don’t want the love story to come to an end.

Stuck in an isolated country house Miranda has the life that she though she would like; that is until she realizes that her high fashion life and mud don’t always come together. Her husband is away at work if he‘s not with his mistress, her son is in constant trouble at school, she has no friends, no life, nothing but this rotten garden that was once a showplace.

So what’s a girl to do, she hires a French gardener to put the garden to rights and with it a story that will bind them all together in a way that they never thought possible.

Montefiore creates wonderfully likeable characters each with a voice and a story of their own. You can feel the garden, the town, the people and the heartache that must be endured for there to even possibly be a happily ever after.