Day: April 13, 2022

Suzanne Kelman has become one of my favorite historical fiction authors. Her stories are always well-balanced between contemporary and historical storylines. She always manages to find a unique aspect of history to use as a starting point. Garden of Secrets is no exception.

In this case, I feel like the author succeeds in unique settings for both timeframes. In the contemporary, Laura works as a garden restoration artist. After a personal loss, she accepts an offer to stay with friends and restore a garden on an old estate.

This leads her to a 75-year-old mystery that she feels compelled to solve. Is it because of her own losses? Or is there something else driving her to discover the truth behind the note and items she finds?

That is one thing I really enjoy about this author’s works. She allows the characters to have real reasons for their actions. They don’t fit a stereotype or only do what is expected. People react to things differently, and her characters are always individuals.

The story then unfolds with Laura in the present chasing down clues and trying to figure out the meaning of what she finds. Those chapters alternate periodically with Anya’s (in the past) and a few from Nikolai (also in the past).

Anya and Nikolai’s story is fascinating, although I was slightly slower to warm to it for some reason. I’m not sure why, because it is by far one of the most interesting threads I have read in recent memory.

It is more common to see Germany as the enemy in historical fiction novels, and it is rarely remembered that Russia was an enemy as well – at least to a point.

I don’t want to give anything of their plot away. Usually, I like one storyline slightly better than the other, but in this case, I was eager to get back to either plot. That’s the way to keep a reader engaged.

I do have to say that I love the analogy using the Avon River. Having been there (and it being one of my favorite places ever) I was able to picture it clearly. Not to mention, it was just good life advice as well.

Garden of Secrets is another great entry in the historical fiction genre, and I can never get enough of Suzanne Kelman’s books and I always look forward to the next one.

Try these great historical fiction novels from her as well: A View Across the Rooftops, Under a Sky on Fire, When the Nightingale Sings, When We Were Brave

Author Bio:

Suzanne Kelman is a 2015 Academy of Motion Pictures Nicholl Finalist, Multi-Award-Winning Screenwriter and a Film Producer. As well as working in film she is also an International Amazon Bestselling Fiction Author of the Southlea Bay Series – The Rejected Writers’ Book Club, Rejected Writers Take the Stage and The Rejected Writers’ Christmas Wedding. Born in the United Kingdom, she now resides in Washington State.