I’m very excited to review this next book. It’s called Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen. I gave this book five stars. It was amazing!

Here comes the spoilers in case you want to read this book yourself.

WARNING: SPOILERS

Garden Spells is about the Waverly family. Claire and Sydney. They are sisters that are the complete opposite. Sydney was a wild child while Claire was a homebody, who did right by everyone.

The Waverly’s were highly popular in their cozy North Carolina town. They were popular and well known because they were something magical. They knew things and things would happen when they were around. They weren’t per say witches, but there was something to them. The townspeople didn’t really care for them because they were different. Claire however, always tried to make people like her. She was a caterer and made wonderful meals that everyone loved. She tried to please everyone.

There was Evanelle, an Aunt from what I gathered who also lived in town. She had the power of giving things to people when they need them. A lot of people in town were afraid of her because you never know what she could give you. It was like something called to her and she needed to give it you right away. It could be in the middle of the night and she would have to get it to you.

Sydney ran away from her home where she was living with her daughter Bay and her boyfriend David. David was a bad man. He would beat Sydney within inches of her life, so she and Bay decided to move away from there and back home with Claire, who hadn’t seen her in years. They didn’t always get a long and didn’t see eye to eye.

So when Sydney showed up out of nowhere with a daughter who is five years old, Claire was shocked. She didn’t know what to think about all of this. Sydney wouldn’t tell her anything about the life she was living.

As time passed, the girls became closer. A man named Tyler lived next door to them and Claire had a thing for him, but it was more like he had one for her. You see there was an apple tree that was planted in the Waverly’s backyard. It had a mind of it’s own. It would throw apples and it would spread it’s branches out. It liked the attention. It was magic. It was said that if you ate one of those apples, you would see the one thing you were destined for. It would be either horribly devastating or wonderful.

Tyler ate one of those apples and he saw something that he never imagined. He saw Claire. She pushed him away as much as she could, she didn’t want love or to get hurt. However, there was something about him that drew her in.

Sydney spent a lot of time with Tyler because they were becoming great friends. They would tell each other everything and he would talk about Claire all the time.

Claire would make her infamous magical food to wean people away from her, but it didn’t work on Tyler. She couldn’t stay away from him any longer.

Sydney found Henry, a boy she knew since grade school. She just wanted to be friends with him, but Henry didn’t want that and it took him a good chunk of the book to tell her. At the end, she realized that she loved him. She kissed him to be sure, and it was pure electric. There was one thing though, there was David. The ex.

David pops in at the end of the story during a party that Claire and Sydney are throwing. He carries a gun with him and he shoots Henry in the shoulder. Bay hid away from David, she didn’t want anything to do with him. The tree threw an apple at him, thinking it came from Bay and he ate it. What he saw a few seconds later changed everything. He dropped the gun and he fled.

In the end David gets caught and goes to prison. They believe he saw his death in jail. Henry and Sydney spoke about marriage and Bay became incredibly happy. Claire and Tyler end up together with a baby and an engagement.

They all lived happily ever after.

That was my review of Garden Spells. I know what I wrote didn’t do the book justice but it’s only a tad of what this book is about. If I had to compare it to anything, it reminded me of Practical Magic.