Publisher: Candlewick Press
Format: Paperback ARC
Number of pages: 384
Publishing: March 14th, 2023
Source: ARC book tour
Opening Lines: "The Orange Boat doesn't carry oranges anymore."
Tara Dairman wrote one of my favorite book series, All Four Stars. It was about Gladys Gatsby, a girl who had a passion for gourmet cooking and a dream to be a food critic. It's a wonderful book. So needless to say, I was very excited to learn about Tara's ARC book tour and happy to have an opportunity to read an early copy of her latest book, The Girl from Earth's End.
Henna was delivered to Earth's End twelve years ago on the Orange Boat, ever since she's been living there with her two loving papas, Niall and Joaquim. Their home is on the site of a former monastery with a lighthouse tower nearby. Papa Niall happily paints and meditates, while Joaquim and Henna work around the island, fishing and preparing meals. Henna has even cultivated a beautiful herb garden and is happiest among her beloved plants and trees, until Papa Niall begins to grow seriously ill. Concerned for his health, Henna enters a horticultural competition, and even lands herself a scholarship to the prestigious St. Basil's Conservatory, a boarding school that is rumored to house seeds of every plant ever grown. When Henna learns of a legendary, long-extinct plant with miraculous healing powers, she knows that she must leave the solitude of her island and venture to St. Basil's in order to save her beloved Papa Niall. However, upon her arrival to her new school, Henna is disappointed to learn that she won't have free reign to explore the school, instead she and her new friend P are to be companions to Lora Windover, so instead of receiving their horticultural education, the Headmistress informs them that they will be assisting Lora with her wheelchair and basically carrying out what ever menial task she has in mind for them. However, Lora has plans of her own, she is tired of having servants who do everything for her and instead, wants to be left alone. Free to explore the school, Henna and P begin their quest to track down the infamous Nightwalker seeds that can save her papa's life.
Tara writes these beautiful stories with children who have great passions, Gladys loved her gourmet cooking and Henna has a knack for cultivating her plants. With all the lovely details about the spices and dishes Gladys was making and the way that she describes Henna repotting a plant and washing the soil off the roots of a tree, her stories inspire me to want to bake a Creme Brule or grow an herb garden of my own. And oh, how I loved Henna's two papas. Joaquim kind of reminds me of Grandfather from the book Heidi by Johanna Spyri. Like Grandfather, Joaquim and Niall weren't ever expecting to have a child come into their lives but they all learn to adapt to the new situation and form a very tight bond. Like Heidi, Henna soon moves away from the comfort of her quiet life of her family and is at a school taking care of a Lora. Lora however is nothing like Clara, she is by no means frail, and I just love how she doesn't want people to do things for her, instead she wants to live her life to the fullest and do things for herself. I also really liked P aka Pierett do Mar, a nonbinary character who uses they as their pronoun, they were certainly full of life, adventurous and brought a lot of humor to the story. The friendship that developed between all three of these characters was truly a joy to read about. Overall, this was a beautiful setting, and lovely characters. I also really enjoyed the authors note at the back of the book, learning about the inspiration for the story, both the geographical and historical components that went into the book. Despite Nightwalker not being a real plant, it was interesting to learn about other plants with similar qualities. So, both an entertaining and informative read. Give this to a budding gardener and fans of Tara Dairman's other books, it's a gem of a book and one not to be missed.
**A huge thank you to Tara Dairman for including me in the ARC tour and happy reading to the person I'm sending this off to next.**
No comments:
Post a Comment