As a Southern woman, I love a good novel set in the South (that's capital S on purpose) and this one does not disappoint.

Lila, Henry, and Abigail have just lost their mother, who has died on the grounds of the family home in a small muscadine vineyard. Their father died when the children were young so they are only left with each other. Lila has moved far away to the coast of Maine where she lives as a widow with her dogs and runs a weaving business. Henry has moved away as well, keeping his identity as a gay man secret from all his family members except Lila. And Abigail has remained at home to care for their mother as she grows older. With the news of their mother's death, Lila and Henry come back to the homestead to settle her affairs. It's then that family secrets start to come to light, and the bulk of the book is about the unfolding of layer after layer of secrets.

This novel is full of lush descriptions and careful characterizations. I felt like the people might have been people that I know and the places were places I've traveled. The title was confusing to me as muscadines were not a strong theme throughout, although there was a bit about how Lila hated them because she once had an unripe one and afterward would never eat them again. Over and over again the siblings are asked to reconsider what they believed to be true as children and reexamine the evidence as the adults they have now become. Things they believed as facts are revealed to be false and it shakes their very foundations.

I was generously provided an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

This is a lovely and thought-provoking story about three siblings whose lives are upended after their mother's sudden death. The characters are believable, as is the plot. I couldn't put it down. Truth and love prevails.

I did not finish The Sweet Taste of Muscadines dur to unexpected content. Pamela Terry's writing style is beautiful and lyrical. So my review has nothing to with her writing. I just didn't care for the content.

A mother’s sudden death.
She died in the muscadine grove.
Why was she even there? She never frequented it nor preferred it.
Now unknown secrets, deceit and lies come to light.
A intriguing story about three siblings on a quest to get answers. Much has to be overcome to find the truth. And, lots of healing.
The beginning started out slow but keep on reading, the second half was the best.
Many thanks to NetGalley, Random House/Ballantine Books and author, Pamala Terry, for the opportunity to read this book for my honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

What if your father wasn't killed in the war? What if your younger sister wasn't a full sister but had a different father than you? The protagonist in this book experiences both of these issues and pursues adventures with her younger gay brother to resolve recently unexpected discoveries about her childhood.
The value of this particular writing strategy is that the reader can learn vicariously about what happens when the conceived notion of your life is changed by accidental discoveries. In this story, Lily received a phone call from her younger sister that their mother had suddenly died with a funeral expected shortly. Upon arrival at their mother's house, Lily suspected their mother had died trying to get something out of the Muscadine garden. Her explorations exhumed a box with "treasures" none of the three siblings dreamed of. Lily continued to search for answers to questions from those "treasures", letters from the past. She pushed past the unpleasantness of the possibilities all the way to Scotland and her father, living after being "dead" for most of her life. The following reunion of father, daughter, and son brought redemption and resolution to many of Lily and Henry's questions about their life choices.
Life is full of unexpected choices. Reading about the choices that people make in their lives only to discover that those choices were based on unknown circumstances is helpful to young people looking at their choices in life and trying to figure out how to make good choices for good outcomes.

The Sweet Taste of Muscadines is a debut novel by author Pamela Terry- but; it doesn’t read like a new novel. The writing flows in this slow starting novel about three very different siblings and the mystery they uncover when they get together after their mother dies unexpectedly.

I thought this was a really good read- crisp writing, descriptive settings and the characters are so well thought out and developed they just felt real. The suspense builds slowly as well, but it’s one of those plots where you need to keep reading to find out all the answers!!!

Well done, smooth novel and I really wouldn’t change a single thing!! Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group- Ballentine and author Pamela Terry for a temporary digital advance review copy for me to read and enjoy. As always, my review is voluntary and my opinions are my own.

I received a free ARC from Netgalley.
I'm not a Southerner, but the lush descriptions of this southern town definitely help set the stage for this family filled with secrets. Lila, Henry, and Abbie lost their father in the war. Now their mother has died in a mysterious way so they all head home to say farewell and find out that there are more secrets to solve than they realized. A warm and heartwarming story of siblings pulling together in hard times.

Excellent debut novel. Novels about the south are often subject to excessive adjectives and adverbs, I suppose in an attempt to set the environment/mood. Terry verges on excess but does not cross the line, especially with her well written dialog. Three siblings, two that have left their small southern town and one that stays, come together at their mother’s death. Family secrets are reveled and put to rest. Terry paints a realistic picture of both small town Georgia and the wilds of Scotland.

I have voluntarily read and reviewed a copy of this title given to me via NetGalley. This book was just amazing. I just lost myself in this story and didn’t want it to end. It was really well written and just drew in you into these characters lives. I look forward to seeing what’s next from this author.

I wept at the conclusion of this difficult and beautiful book. It is hard to believe that it is the first by author Pamela Terry. The prose in 'The Sweet Taste of Muscadines' described a location where I have never traveled and painted the physical beauty of the South. The author juxtaposed this beauty with somewhat harsh descriptions of the people and particularly the Southern Baptist church goers in the southern town of Lila, the main character's childhood home. This book was rich with characters and thought provoking issues that strived to lead me in directions which I ultimately may have not agreed, but the ride was worth it. I will say one thing for certain, this story has stayed with me. I imagine I will be revisiting it in my mind for a long while.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

The Sweet Taste of Muscadines
A Novel
by Pamela Terry
Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine
Ballantine Books
General Fiction (Adult) | Women's Fiction
Pub Date 16 Mar 2021 | Archive Date 30 Jun 2021

I am a member of Friends & Fiction and I heard about this book from Mary Kay Andrews. I was impressed with the writing of this debut author!~ Pamela Terry did a great job intriguing me with all the unanswered questions in my head. It was a slow start for me but I loved the second half much more.
Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for the ARC.
4 star

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. Lily gets a call from her sister that her mother was found dead near the muscadine arbor. Lilly and Henry meet their sister Abby in their hometown to celebrate their mother's life. But what was their mom doing out in the middle of the arbor with a soup spoon in her hand? They begin to dug up many secrets that changes everything they know about their family and their father who passed away many years before. This book had a slow start but not slow enough to quit reading it. I liked the second half much better when the questions were being asked! #thesweettasteofmuscadines #pamelaterry #June2021

Rarely has a book caught me so off guard and had me tumbling headfirst into it’s captivating world.! The book started out slow but I understand that it was really necessary for the author to really flesh out the characters so we would understand who they were and why they were experiencing the feelings they had. I then fell in love with each and every one of them . She described them so well I had vivid pictures of them in my mind that sometimes made me laugh out loud . The descriptions of Scotland made me feel as if I was there and sounded like the most beautiful place on Earth. I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed this story about this family and the long held secret that almost destroyed them. It brought tears, laughter and sighs. What more could you ask of a book.

I received invite to read, thank for the ARC.

Debut Novel

To reckon with your upbringing.
She finds a clue about the past, her family's past, her past.
Maybe all was not as seemed or thought.

Her mother's unexpected, mysterious death sends Lila back to her hometown. Elusive truths or shall we say, family secrets, are unraveled.

A Southern story of a somewhat dysfunctional family and the secrets that are unearthed upon the mother's surprising death. The writing is decent but a little slow paced and filler-filled for my taste. More prose devoted to setting and description than character while I prefer the opposite. This will appeal to people who like the slow, insidious, story with invocations of powerful place.

This is going to sound odd, but this is a sweet tale of lose, betrayal, and coming together. I learned so much from this book, from what a muscadine is, weaving, and the joyous moments of a non funeral.
The characters were all great, multi dimensional, and well rounded.
The real story was the settings. They are their own characters. I loved the book and will recommend it to everyone.
I want to thank Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me this ARC for an honest review.

I received a free ebook of The Sweet Taste of Muscadines from NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

Wow! What an unexpected pleasure to read this book. Reminiscent of Pat Conroy's South, Terry paints a Southern setting filled with charm and grace, prejudice and lies. Adult Lila and her brother and sister come together in the wake of their mother's death. Lila, the oldest, had longed lived in Maine, away from the stifling South where she bore the loneliness of her father's early death. Henry, the middle child, had escaped to New England to live an authentic and happy life as a gay man, a lifestyle he deemed impossible in the judgmental environment of his youth. And Abigail, the youngest and their mother's favorite, had stayed in the role of Southern belle and mother's best friend. Coping with the reality of their mother's sudden passing and discovering that the foundation of their lives was built on lies causes each to turn off their set path in order to bring some peace and truth to their souls.

The characters and settings in this novel are so well drawn - the Southern older ladies who know how to entertain and how to cut to the quick; the overbearing and overarching Southern Baptist church with its absolute certainty of how one should live a godly life; the stunning isolating beauty of the Maine and the Scottish coasts. Terry pulls these disparate elements together in a gorgeous tale.

#NetGalley #TheSweetTasteofMuscadines

Narrator Lila Breedlove is a transplanted Southerner now living as a young widow on Wigeon Island, off the coast of Maine, who says of the South, “The roots of its influence still run through me like vines, entwining memories and creeping under the doors of my dreams.” A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, she lives quietly and successfully seaside, designing and creating woven garments, an occupation metaphoric of The Sweet Taste of Muscadines’ intricately woven tale.
In an intimate, first person voice as confessional as a private journal, author Pamela Terry lulls the reader with descriptive passages both atmospheric and introspective in such a subtextual manner as to significantly assist a story built on a family dynamic predicated on secrets forcing their way to the light.
The sudden death of her cool, distant mother calls Lila home to Wesleyan, South Carolina, where she’s reunited with younger siblings, Henry, her beloved brother, and Abigail, the doting sister who remained tied to their mother’s side. Lila muses, “It’s never wise to wonder if you’d be friends with your family were you not bound together by blood.” In the case of Henry, “There was no one on earth I’d rather be with than my brother.” In the case of the emotionally erratic Abigail, it’s another story, and although the sisters have culled different lives, a bond remains out of familial loyalty.
Southern tradition, cultural nuance, and unresolved childhood memories lie at the foundation of this engaging story. Because matriarch Geneva Burns is found dead with a spoon in her hand in the family’s muscadine arbor, the questions raised begin the unearthing of the family’s well-kept secret, which startlingly redefines their understanding of what happened to their father, and sets the wheels in motion for Lila and Henry to ultimately go to Scotland in search of further discovery.
Lovely, lyrical, and often profound, The Sweet Taste of Muscadines is women’s fiction at its finest and then something more. Written in two parts while weaving familial loyalty with the meaning of home throughout, the search for truth on the backdrops of Wesleyan and the remote island of Ben Mathan, Scotland is breathtakingly visceral, in an emotionally evocative story with a strong sense of place. Deep seated fear pertaining to keeping up appearances in the face of societal judgement against what the family is hiding impact the story, and Terry writes with a warm-hearted, equitable hand. There are no loose threads in The Sweet Taste of Muscadines’ rich fabric. A sonorous look at “the past we take with us, along with new understanding and the seeds of forgiveness,” it’s a satisfying, heart and soul read with resonance, sure to make you a fan of author Pamela Terry.

Pamela Terry’s descriptive writing explores family secrets and the destruction of people raced in a homophobic Southern state during the 50’s. The mystery of the mother’s death propels a brother and sister to journey to a rocky island in Scotland to search for their “dead” father. It contains enough mystery and descriptive sense of place that the reader is thrust into the cloying Southern heat and the wild Scottish wind and rain. A delightful read!