The Peach Keeper
Author: Sarah Addison Allen
Genre: General Fiction
Publication Date: March 22, 2011
Publisher: Bantam

Source: I received a copy of this book for free from TLC Book Tours to participate in a virtual book tour. This did not influence my opinion of the book.

The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Chased the Moon welcomes you to her newest locale: Walls of Water, North Carolina, where the secrets are thicker than the fog from the town’s famous waterfalls, and the stuff of superstition is just as real as you want it to be.

It’s the dubious distinction of thirty-year-old Willa Jackson to hail from a fine old Southern family of means that met with financial ruin generations ago. The Blue Ridge Madam—built by Willa’s great-great-grandfather during Walls of Water’s heyday, and once the town’s grandest home—has stood for years as a lonely monument to misfortune and scandal. And Willa herself has long strived to build a life beyond the brooding Jackson family shadow. No easy task in a town shaped by years of tradition and the well-marked boundaries of the haves and have-nots.

But Willa has lately learned that an old classmate—socialite do-gooder Paxton Osgood—of the very prominent Osgood family, has restored the Blue Ridge Madam to her former glory, with plans to open a top-flight inn. Maybe, at last, the troubled past can be laid to rest while something new and wonderful rises from its ashes. But what rises instead is a skeleton, found buried beneath the property’s lone peach tree, and certain to drag up dire consequences along with it.

For the bones—those of charismatic traveling salesman Tucker Devlin, who worked his dark charms on Walls of Water seventy-five years ago—are not all that lay hidden out of sight and mind. Long-kept secrets surrounding the troubling remains have also come to light, seemingly heralded by a spate of sudden strange occurrences throughout the town.

Now, thrust together in an unlikely friendship, united by a full-blooded mystery, Willa and Paxton must confront the dangerous passions and tragic betrayals that once bound their families—and uncover truths of the long-dead that have transcended time and defied the grave to touch the hearts and souls of the living.

Resonant with insight into the deep and lasting power of friendship, love, and tradition, The Peach Keeper is a portrait of the unshakable bonds that—in good times and bad, from one generation to the next—endure forever.

My Thoughts:

Sarah Addison Allen is a magical writer.  She has a way of creating an engaging, mystical story that sucks you in from the first page.  The Peach Keeper is a delightful novel that follows in the lines of her previous works, Garden Spells, The Sugar Queen, and The Girl Who Chased the Moon.  Willa Jackson and Paxton Osgood are former classmates thrown together amidst a scandal. Paxton is renovating the Blue Ridge Madam, a historic building built by Willa’s great-great-grandfather. During the process a body is uncovered, igniting a mystery involving both Willa and Paxton’s families.

The novel takes place in the present day with reflections from Paxton’s grandmother, Agatha, to 1936. Through these flashbacks, the reader learns the history of both Willa and Paxton’s families and the relationship between their grandmothers. Concurrently, as the mystery is unfolding, the women are also struggling with budding romances of their own, which I found very sweet although a bit frustrating at times.  Paxton’s “relationship” with Sebastian was a bit odd, in my opinion.  I did not quite understand the dynamic between the two of them; the build-up; and then the final outcome.  It was all just a tad strange for me.

Overall, this is a lovely story, with everything that a reader looks for in a great book – mystery, friendship, family, budding romance, with a dash of whimsy and mysticism. Ms. Allen has a way of creating a world that you know in your head is not believable, but in your heart it makes you wonder…

Final Rating:

Author Links:

• Sarah’s website
• Book Club discussion questions
• Recipe
  for Rachel’s Coffee Snacks (from the book)
• Read an excerpt
• The Peach Keeper on Amazon.com
• Sarah on Facebook
• Sarah on Twitter

Sarah Addison Allen’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Giveaway:

Thanks to the publisher, I have 1 copy of this book to give away to one lucky reader of the USA or Canada.

Rules:

1. The giveaway will start on April 27 and end on May 4.

2. You must be a resident of USA or Canada to enter.

3. Once the giveaway is over, one winner will be selected. That person will have 48 hours to respond to my notification email from contestmachine.com or another winner will be selected.

4. Prize will be sent directly from the publisher.

How to enter:

Just enter your name and email address in the form below! That’s it!

Til next time, stay crazy….for books, that is!

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