A review by sdawginthebuilding
Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

lighthearted

2.0

The concept of the garden with magical plants that could manipulate people’s feelings reminded me of Just Add Magic so I picked up this book hoping it would be an adult version of that. I was hoping Claire would use her magical plants to fix her and other townspeople’s problems. While she sorta did this, I think the author focused more on the fact that the Waverleys all had some special gift idk. I think it’s a little strange for only one person to have powers related to the garden while the others didn’t. 

One thing that bothered me was how intuitive and conscious Bay (a five year old!!) was about things that I don’t remember even being aware of at that age. I think she should’ve been written a little older. 

Throughout the book, I was anticipating
David’s arrival in Bascom. When it finally happened at the end, the resolution was a little underwhelming.
Much like all the conflict in this book, nothing ever felt intense or serious enough even though there were some pretty heavy issues involved (domestic violence, rape, etc).

All in all, I definitely felt the small town vibes. This was a pretty light read.
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