Page Forty-One

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

I both liked this book and did not like this book. The story is fairly intriguing: a 4-year girl found after a boat docks in Australia is taken in by a loving couple and raised as their own, until she is told in her late teens that she is not their biological child. The girl, now named Nell, attempts to piece together her past, which leads her to the mysterious Blackhurst Manor in England. Contributing to the search after her death is her granddaughter, Cassandra.

The story is indeed a mystery, but there are so many voices in the text at times it became a bit frustrating: Nell, Cassandra, and Eliza are the three main narrators, but thrown in are also Rose, Adeline, Eliza, Luis (whose role in the story was oddly developed), Nathaniel ... and I am likely missing one or two characters. The ending was fairly predicatable and Morton's playing off of well known fairytales and children's stories, such as The Secret Garden - even including Frances Hodgson Burnett as a character where it is implied she used the garden at Blackhurst Manor to inspire what would become The Secret Garden - was almost annoying, though I could see this would appeal to many readers.

Overall, however, a good escapist read for the summer.