Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen

 

Reviewed by Jeanne

Eighteen-year-old Zoey is ready to spread her wings.  After her mother’s death and her father’s remarriage, Zoey has felt the odd person out in the family.  Now the summer before she starts college, she decides to move to Mallow Island, SC where her mother owned a condo.  She’s hoping to find some trace of the woman she barely remembers.  Instead, she finds a community of diverse characters, all of whom have something to hide. . . and not all of them are alive.

I have loved all of Sarah Addison Allen’s books.  They have a warmth and a sweetness that lingers long after the last page has been turned.  They also feature characters that I come to know and love and want to spend more time with.  Allen never leaves you hanging but she also tends to leave her characters on the cusp of their greatest happiness, so that the reader has a sense of hope at the end.  However, I had heard that this book was a bit different from her others, darker, and with more characters.  I put off reading it, a bit afraid that I might not like this new direction.

I need not have worried.  While there are a lot of characters, I had no trouble following them along through all the twists and turns.  And there were twists in this one, but not the “gotcha!” thiller twists, but little surprises that, in retrospect, made perfect sense. There’s Mac the chef, who awakens to a sprinkling of cornmeal every morning; Charlotte the henna artist, who is running from her past; Roscoe, the apartment manager, who cares about all the residents; and the elusive Lucy, whom no one has seen in years, but who occasionally peers out the windows of her condo.

This was, for me, vintage Allen.  There were characters I loved and cared about; touches of magic with the (fictional, sadly) dellawisps, the little blue birds who give the apartment complex its name; ghosts who linger and want to tell their own parts of the story; and secrets, mostly of the human heart.  This is also a story of family, not just biological kinship, but a chosen family.

In short, I loved it and am sure it will be on my list of best books of 2024.

The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen

 Reviewed by Ambrea

Willa Jackson has spent much of her life in Walls of Water, North Carolina, living down her family’s reputation of genteel poverty.  She works at a sporting goods store downtown with her friend, Rachel, who has the distinction of being a coffee connoisseur, and she lives a simple life with very little mystery or adventure (much to her chagrin).  But with the resurrection of the Blue Ridge Madam, a sprawling mansion built by Willa’s great-great-grandfather during the town’s heyday, and the grisly discovery of a skeleton on the property, Willa must face her family history head-on if she wants to banish the ghosts that have haunted her family for generations.  Together with Paxton Osgood, a do-gooder socialite of the very prominent Osgood family, Willa will uncover strange and terrifying secrets about Walls of Water—and forge unshakable bonds of friendship.

I loved listening to The Peach Keeper.  It reminded me a great deal of Garden Spells and The Girl Who Chased the Moon, but it has its own unique characters—although a few familiar faces do make an appearance—and its own unique story.  It has much the same flavor of Sarah Addison Allen’s other novels:  a quirky southern town, small hints of magic, complex mother-daughter relationships, and a deep sense of family and tradition that influences many of the thoughts, feelings, and actions of characters.

Like Allen’s previous novels, The Peach Keeper is weighty with history.  Specifically, it focuses on the turbulent past of the Jackson and Osgood families—and, more importantly, the unshakable bond held by Willa and Paxton’s grandmothers, Georgie and Agatha—as they clashed throughout the history of Walls of Water.  It’s a complex story with finely detailed characters, deep family roots, and subtle hints of magic that paint a rich tapestry of loss and love.

I enjoyed the way Allen beautifully describes the Appalachian Mountains.  In Garden Spells, The Sugar Queen, and The Girl Who Chased the Moon, readers are introduced to the mountains of southern Appalachia and have the opportunity to get a taste of the region.  However, in The Peach Keeper, I was able to get an even better glimpse of the Blue Ridge Mountains and it’s a beautiful sight to behold.  Since I’m familiar with the Blue Ridge Mountains and the surrounding region, I was inordinately pleased by Allen’s descriptions of the mountains and her fictional town, Walls of Water.  It’s a breathtaking location that feels right at home in the mountains I love, and I was incredibly excited by her reference to landmarks I knew and descriptions I recognized.

It was unexpectedly thrilling.

I also enjoyed the characters.  It’s wonderful to see Willa and Paxton’s relationship develop, to see a reflection of their grandmother’s relationship in their newly budding friendship.  I thought it was interesting to see how their lives unfolded and intertwined.  Moreover, I enjoyed seeing how they handled the separate romantic interests that crop up in their lives.  Love and excitement is the last thing Willa is looking for with Colin, and Paxton is struggling to keep the status quo steady between herself and her best friend, Sebastian.  Their relationships are complicated—Will trying to live down her past, Paxton trying to preserve her dearest friendship and escape her mother’s shadow—but it’s refreshing to see them confront their dilemmas head-on, to see them work through the everyday struggles of their lives to see their own self-worth.

Truthfully, I enjoyed watching them grow, figure things out, fall in love—and just live their lives.  It’s almost sickly sweet, I have to admit, but it’s all worth it for the feeling that everything worked out all right in the end.

However, I will note that The Peach Keeper feels a little darker than Allen’s other novels.  I mean, sure, Julian is a particularly terrifying villain in The Sugar Queen and domestic abuse is front and center in Garden Spells, but most of Allen’s stories feel lighter,  like you know that things will all work out in the end.  The Peach Keeper, on the other hand, has a darker undertone to it that influences much of the novel and makes it, in my opinion, a more serious novel.  Although it begins with Georgie and Agatha’s ordeal in 1936, the pall of their respective terror and remorse doesn’t really dissipate.  The violence feels fresh, more palpable, more pervasive, especially with the ghost of Tucker Devlin hanging over the story, which gives it a much different feeling than Allen’s other works.

The Girl Who Chased the Moon by Sarah Addison Allen

Reviewed by Ambrea

After her mother died, Emily Benedict arrived in Mullaby, North Carolina, with the hope of solving some of the riddles that had plagued her for years—and, more importantly, get to know the grandfather she never knew.  But, as she digs deep into the mysteries of her mother’s adolescence, she discovers that Mullaby is rife with mysteries:  rooms where wallpaper changes to suit a person’s mood, unexplained lights that appear at midnight, and magical cakes—like those of Julia Winterson.

Julia, who has returned to her former hometown, is known and loved for her cakes.  She has a magical touch with flour, butter, milk, eggs, and sugar that seems to enthrall the entire town; however, Julia doesn’t just bake to keep herself and her father’s business afloat:  she bakes to recall the past and, she hopes, bring back a lost love.  She hopes to leave as soon as she can.  Her rocky relationship with Sawyer aside, Julia wants to leave Mullaby—and her hurtful past—behind.

But Mullaby is not what Emily or Julia has come to expect.  Together, they will discover a richness and beauty to Mullaby that they’ve never seen—and a love that they never thought they would find.

I actually picked up The Girl Who Chased the Moon as an audiobook.  It’s one of the first audiobooks I’ve listened to since Hank the Cowdog was considered one of my favorites—back when we still had a cassette tape player in our car—so it’s rather special to me, since it revived and heightened my interest in listening to books again.  Although I’ve listened to other audiobooks that I’ve enjoyed a little more than Sarah Addison Allen’s novel (such as Dante and Aristotle Discover the Secrets of the Universe and Kitchens of the Great Midwest), I was pleasantly surprised by The Girl Who Chased the Moon.

Like both Garden Spells and The Sugar Queen, Allen’s novel is filled with little unexpected joys, everyday magic that jumps out and surprises you.  Like the wallpaper in Emily’s room, or Sawyer’s “sweet sense,” or the secrets of the Mullaby’s most illustrious family, or the frogs that hold a special significance for Emily’s grandfather.  It’s fascinating to see this magical dynamic at work in Mullaby, to see how the town accepts and even celebrates some of its local oddities.

Speaking of oddities, I found I really liked Julia and her magical ability to bake delicious cakes.  More than any other character, maybe even more than Emily, Julia held a special place in my heart.  I liked her for her troubled adolescence and her steely resolve to live her own life, to leave Mullaby behind once she gets her father’s business and her rocky relationship with Sawyer settled.  She’s essentially damaged by her past, by a number of bad years in her youth, but she has managed to heal and reinvent herself and, more importantly, grow into the woman she wishes to be.

I’m not saying Julia isn’t flawed, and I’m not saying she isn’t damaged.  She isn’t perfect, and I admire her for overcoming a number of challenges in her life—and yet she still manages to have hope.  That’s why she continues to bake, why she continues to leave the window open when she’s making her cakes:  she has hope for a better future and hope for reconnecting with someone she thought she’d lost forever.  It’s heart-warming and wonderful.

And I loved it.

I also thought Rebecca Lowman, who narrated the novel, did a splendid job of distinguishing between characters and reviving the cadence of a small North Carolina town.  She helped breathe life into the characters, playing upon the drawl and twang sometimes found in Appalachia, and she did a wonderful job of pacing the story, allowing it to unfold naturally.  While the story was sometimes strange—and, sometimes, I didn’t always enjoy the characters Ms. Lowman played—I found I enjoyed it overall.  It’s a sweet novel with a decent narrator, intriguing (and, occasionally, baffling) characters, and a beautiful little love story thrown into the mix.

The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen

Reviewed by Ambrea

Josey Cirrini is the daughter of Marco and Margaret Cirrini.  Margaret, a true southern belle and town beauty, and Marco, the city’s golden boy and favorite son, were a perfect couple; however, Josey was far from a perfect child.  Now twenty-seven-years-old, Josey has realized she will never live up to her mother’s expectations—and so she hides a stockpile of treats and paperback romances in her closet to escape to each night, wishing for circumstances to be different.

When she discovers Della Lee Baker hiding in her closet, Josey finds her last sanctuary has been taken from her.  Suddenly, she’s stuck with Della Lee’s tough love approach to life and she’s soon expanding her small world, befriending Chloe Finley—a young woman who has a startling talent for finding books when she most needs them—and talking to her longtime crush, Adam.

But Della Lee has a secret, a secret that’s been hidden from Josey for more than twenty years.

Like Garden Spells, Allen’s previous novel, The Sugar Queen has little threads of magic laced throughout the novel:  Josey with her uncanny ability to detect secrets, even if she doesn’t understand them; Chloe with her books, which magically appear when she needs them; Rawley, who always keeps a promise he makes, no matter the cost to his heart; Julian with his magnetic personality that compels any and every woman’s attentions; and Marlena with her surprising skills at chasing away ghosts.

Allen has a special skill in portraying her characters.  She gives careful descriptions of her characters, and she pinpoints the little unexpected (read:  magical) things that populate their lives, linking them inextricably to a thin veil of magic that permeates the town.  And she’s meticulous in showing character perspective, allowing her readers a peek into the lives of her characters—such as the way Josey equates the best things in life with sugary sweets, or Chloe recounts her moods and experiences in the books that follow her—by showing the world through their eyes.  In Sugar Queen, I found this simply added another layer to her characters.

Although I enjoyed The Sugar Queen, I’m afraid I just couldn’t enjoy it as much as Garden Spells.  I don’t know why, but I simply found Garden Spells more appealing in its style and its plot—and, more importantly, in its portrayal of magic.  While I liked the magical elements of The Sugar Queen (specifically, I liked the idea of Chloe having books that followed her around on a regular basis, reflecting her moods and needs), it felt a little more obvious.  Garden Spells, except for the apple tree, felt more subtle.  The Waverly sisters have peculiar gifts, but they aren’t advertised overtly; rather, their magic is woven into the fabric of their family, like fine threads, and it feels almost like a secret.  The Sugar Queen doesn’t have that:  magic feels more like a nuisance than a gift.

Overall, however, I enjoyed The Sugar Queen and I would definitely recommend it for fans of Sarah Addison Allen.

First Frost by Sarah Addison Allen

She finally understood that, no matter how hard you try, you can’t make someone love you.  You can’t stop them from making the wrong decision.

There is no magic for that.

~Sarah Addison Allen, First Frost

Reviewed by Jeanne

October in Bascomb, NC isn’t exactly like October in other places, at least not for the Waverleys.  It’s a restless time when everyone feels itches they can’t quite scratch.  Things will settle down after the first frost, when the contrary apple tree will perversly bloom and fill the air with spring petals.  Until then, Claire will work obsessively on her new business of creating candies that bring heart’s ease or fond memories, while her sister Sydney longs for another child. Sydney’s daughter Bay has the gift of knowing where things belong and knows she belongs with Josh Matteson, one of the most popular boys in town.  Unfortunately, Josh doesn’t seem to feel the same way—especially not after the way Bay humiliated herself by giving him a note in front of his friends, proving that she’s just another one of those weird Waverleys and a girl trying to rise above her station.

The Waverleys have long had a reputation for oddness and a whiff of magic about them.  Not spells or incantations type of magic, but there’s a bit of strangeness there.  Claire works wonders with her cooking, settling feuds or igniting romance while a trip to Sydney’s hair salon can transform one’s life.  Even Cousin Evanelle has a talent:  she gives people things they don’t know they will need. 

Now a stranger has come to town, a man who seems to be taking a great interest in the Waverleys in general and Claire in particular.  He says he knows a secret, one which might destroy all that they’ve built. 

I fell in love with Sarah Addison Allen’s writing when I read The Girl Who Chased the Moon.  I wasn’t sure any other book would measure up, and then I read her first novel, Garden Spells.  The blend of sisters in conflict, a wonderfully realized North Carolina setting, an apple tree which became one of my all-time favorite characters, and the lush sensory details made for a perfectly delectable story as far as I was concerned.  When I learned that Allen had finally written a sequel to that nearly perfect book, I was torn.  On the one hand, I wanted to revisit some old friends and find out how they were doing; but I was also afraid that the return visit would be a letdown.  

I’m happy to report that I thoroughly enjoyed First Frost.  The magic was back though I want to be quick to point out that you don’t have to have read the first book to enjoy this one.  It’s a sparkling confection, much like Claire’s special candy; I want to linger on some of the passages to read the descriptions of love, longing, and crisp autumn days even as I want to rush through the pages to find out what happens next.  

When I turned the last page, I could have easily turned to page one and started all over.  Instead I decided to return the book so someone else could experience that Waverley magic.  I know I’ll be going back to it again.