A review by helen
Fresh Water for Flowers by Valérie Perrin

4.0

I really liked the main character, Violette. She’s a French woman in her late 40s who works as a cemetery keeper (a job I didn’t know existed), tends her garden, and opens up her house to the grieving. When her past is slowly revealed, I felt a great deal of empathy for her.

The writing is beautiful and evocative - I could clearly imagine the cemetery and Violette’s kitchen.

The book is too long though. The story jumps backwards and forwards in time, and incorporates different side plots that are connected by fate and coincidence to the main one. Every time we left the cemetery to follow the story of another adulterous relationship or the mystery of who was responsible for a tragedy 20 years ago, I just wanted to get back to Violette, her steady strength, and her warm home full of cats and gravediggers.

There are some dark and disturbing themes (see content notes) so I really appreciated the moments of humour
(e.g. when she learns to ride a unicycle in order to pretend to be a ghost and scare away some trespassing teenagers)
and the hopeful ending.

Content notes:
child death, grief, adultery, rape, on page sex, adoption, foster care system, manipulative parents, unhappy and unequal marriage, alcohol abuse, suicidal thoughts
 
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