The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt by Chelsea Iversen was the December pick for my IRL book club.
Let's just start with some cover analysis, shall we?
Harriet lives alone in Sunnyside, her London home, after her father disappeared months ago. Her mother is dead, her only friend has moved away, and all that keeps Harriet company is her garden. Well, about that garden. It's wild and crazy and Harriet has to tend to it or it will completely overtake her house. But then there's this inspector coming around and suggesting Harriet had something to do with her father's disappearance. And this charming young man comes around to court her. SPOILER: HE IS NOT CHARMING.
Anyway. Read at your own peril. 3/5 stars
Things I looked up:
Ellen Terry (page 84) - an English actress of the late 19th and early 20th centuries; she was born into a family of actors and began performing as a child, acting in Shakespeare plays in London, and toured throughout the British provinces in her teens
Henry Pickering (page 167) - English portrait painter in the 1700s
round hat (page 11, 276)
tipped his hat (page 18, 82, 282)
tipping his hat (page 33)
below his hat (page 47)
tied on her hat (page 59)
top hat (page 69, 141)
did not wear a hat (page 121)
brim of his hat (page 123)
took his hat off his head (page 149)
tugged firmly at his hat (page 152)
under his hat (page 166)
took off his hat (page 72)
funny hat (page 169)
picked up his hat (page 181)
coat and hat (page 191)
wore no hat (page 201)
beneath his hat (page 229)
fetch our hats (page 281)
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Are you sensitive about violence against women? Would this cover make you think it would be a big role in this book?
Wow. Your description of the book definitely doesn't fit the title, or the cover (I really like both of those!) Violence against children or animals bothers me more than violence against women, but I still don't think I'll read this. Who picked this one for the book club?
ReplyDeleteWe all thought it was going to be a cozy magical realism book! Seriously, we all read the descriptions and thought it would be a good December book. None of the reviews/descriptions we read mentioned the main character getting locked in a basement! So, this was on all of us.
DeleteEep, hard pass. I would not have gotten violence from the cover.
ReplyDeleteIt's fair to say that I am sensitive about violence against woman, and violence in general. I can do a little bit, and then I need to go to a safe space, reading wise. A great example is Strange Sally Diamond - it's an incredible book that I loved, but I had to skim a lot of the bad stuff because I just couldn't go there.
I feel like when I was younger, I read about violence and it didn't have any impact on me. Now I read about it and I have nightmares and get all flustered and I have clearly become a sensitive soul. *sigh* Oh, well. At least I know.
DeleteWell, the cover and title are quite misleading. I'm very sensitive to violence againt women, or any violence really. I will skip this one!
ReplyDeleteI think that skipping it is probably a good idea.
DeleteSounds like, in this example, charming can be disarming, literally. I find violence appalling, but especially this type.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the "charming" was definitely a facade in this one.
DeleteI guess even though you didn’t like it, and found it disturbing, it was well written enough that it got the 3 stars? I was expecting 1 or fewer, actually.
ReplyDeleteI liked the magic! I want a magic garden!
DeleteThe cover and title both make this seem like a Very Different Book from the one you described. I would feel peculiarly misled. (Peculiar is such a specific word -- it implies a sort of whimsy that definitely does not scream "violence against women.")
ReplyDeleteI am reading the most awful horrendous book right now, with so much violence against women and children, it's just disgusting. And yet I like the book. I guess what I'm saying is that I don't have a problem reading fictional violence? I don't know why. It bothers me in that I find it upsetting but it doesn't deter me from reading, you know?
I feel like I used to be a lot better about fictional violence and could tolerate a lot more. But, as I age, I get more and more sensitive to it. Oh, well. I guess knowing that about myself should probably influence what books I select to read.
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