4.5/5 stars

I enjoyed reading this book. It was a dual timeline story from Augusta's current octogenarian life back to her adolescent days.

Augusta is a bit of a cantankerous but warm-hearted character who has moved into a senior community in Florida after basically being forced into retirement as a pharmacist. She grew up in 1920s Brooklyn with a pharmacist father, and she fell in love with the profession at an early age as she and her sister worked in various capacities in his shop. Following her move to Florida, she discovers that her lost love, Irving, the boy who worked as a delivery boy for her father and broke her heart at 17, is also living there. Their paths took very different turns as Augusta never married, and Irving married at 18 had two children and later divorced. After a rocky start for Augusta, they begin to know each other again after many years apart.

The 1920s Augusta was actually my favorite aspect of this book (although the current Augusta was interesting as well). She lost her mother as a young teenager, and she and her sister and father at first tried to muddle through as best they could. But they ended up with the arrival of Augusta's Great Aunt Esther, also a bit of a pharmacist from a small community. Esther's remedies and Augusta's father's clashed as she was more of a holistic, almost "magical" practitioner (I do believe her chicken soup might bring about world peace), and he was a science, by-the-book professional. When Augusta tries one of her aunt's elixirs on someone in secret, she has disastrous results which has long-reaching consequences, so she decides to abandon her aunt's practices.

I loved how Augusta tried to reconcile the two philosophies she witnessed. She loved and respected both her father and hard-headed but compassionate aunt and struggled with their very different approached to serving others in need.

This was a heartwarming and well-worth-it read with Augusta and Irving being cheer-worthy characters.

My sincere thanks to the author, NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing the free early arc of The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern for review. The opinions are strictly my own.

This is such a charming book!

Augusta Stern grew up in Brooklyn in the ‘20s with her father as the local pharmacist. She learned all she could from him, but after her mother’s death, her aunt Esther moved in with them. Augusta is fascinated by Esther’s healing potions and powders.

Irving, the boy who helps out at the pharmacy, has captured Augusta’s heart. But something goes terribly wrong when Augusta tries using Esther’s love elixir on Irving.

Sixty years later, Augusta has had a long career as a pharmacist and has retired to a retirement community in Florida. There, she runs into Irving and a few others from the old neighborhood. Is it too late for second chances? Is it too late for a bit of magic? Was it ever necessary in the first place?

The story jumps back and forth between the two timelines, so you get to know Augusta and her family and friends so well. I loved the touch of magical realism and the push and pull between medicine and magic. But honestly, the banter between “older” Augusta and her friends is what made me laugh.

The writing is beautiful; it flows naturally, and you feel connected to these characters. You’ll feel their loss, grief, and regrets, but Augusta is also so strong and determined. This is a tale spun in magic and tied up with love.

Thank you @stmartinspress for the gifted ebook via NetGalley.

This was a heartwarming story of the life of Augusta (Goldie) Stern. Told in dual timelines, Goldie/Augusta is a vibrant woman who knew what she wanted and pursued her goals. Along the way, she learned from her great aunt that not all that ails someone can be cured by modern medicine. I loved the stories of both timelines and enjoyed the added hint of magical realism. Sometimes, life needs a special touch to make things happen! Fans of Other Birds and the Lost Apothecary will adore this story! 4.5⭐️

I really enjoyed this charming story! The characters were endearing and I loved the second chance romance. The author painted a picture of 1920's Brooklyn and 1980's Florida in a way that felt like it could have been straight out of a movie. I was drawn in immediately and it held my interest throughout. While I loved Aunt Esther's character, the magical realism element of that part of the story was not quite for me. Nonetheless, it did not dissuade me from wanting to see how the story unfolded. This is my first read of Lynda Cohen Loigman's books; I look forward to reading her others!

I absolutely loved the protagonist in The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern! I loved her as a curious child/teen and also as a spunky, slightly grouchy retiree. I've been reading a lot of books lately with dual timelines. They don't always work for me, but this one does! Augusta is a gifted pharmacist who is forced to retire just shy of her 80th birthday. She moves from New York to a retirement community in Florida, where she encounters not one but TWO men from her past. The great mysteries of her past are unraveled slowly in this engrossing, comfort read.

Thanks to NetGalley for early access to this lovely book.

The Matchmaker’s Gift was one of my favorite books last year so I was excited to read Loigman’s new book. The writing in Love Elixir was just as beautiful as in Matchmaker’s Gift. It was a wonderful love story about second chances..

This book just fell a bit flat for me. It was a sweet story but was expecting more magical realism. I had both the audio and the earc. The narrator was engaging but I did not feel compelled to keep picking up the book. It was a cute story that is more historical fiction, told over dual timelines.
3.5

This book! The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is an amazing story. It was the breath of fresh air I desperately needed.

The story follows 2 timelines in the life of Augusta Stern. In her childhood, we see Augusta grow up in the late 1920's. The daughter of a pharmacist, she lives above her father's pharmacy but has never gotten over her own mother's death from diabetes, only months before insulin is developed as a treatment. In helping out at her father's shop, she meets Irving, her father's delivery boy and the two becomes friends. Her aunt also moves in with the family, bringing her own brand of apothecary treatments that prove to be quite helpful to many in the town.

In the second timeline, Augusta is about to turn 80 (1987) and is newly retired. We learn she became a pharmacist as an adult when women were still not fully accepted in the career, but also that she never married or had kids. Now her niece helps her locate a retirement village in FL., but after she moves in she realized Irving is also a resident. This brings up a lot of memories Augusta would prefer not to deal with, as this new chapter in her life is already difficult enough.

Each chapter is well paced and rotates back and forth between Augusta as a child and in her 1987 present and we see things through Augusta's point of view. In many ways it is part second chance love story, part historical fiction, part feminist literature, part mystery. I especially enjoy love story's that feature a mature couple- and I loved how the timelines converged to make all the threads come together. I listened to the entire book in one day while in the car, and I was in tears by the time I got home. It's the best kind of cry, where you laugh through your tears. One of the best books I have read to in a very long time!

Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for access to this eARC.

What a beautiful and heartwarming story! I absolutely adored this dual timeline book. It pulled at my heart strings and Augusta is one of my new favorite characters!

The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern
Lynda Cohen Loigman
October 08, 2024

Growing up In Brooklyn, New York, Augusta Stern fell in love with importance of her father’s profession. He was a pharmacist. He opened his store and moved his family to the apartment upstairs. Solomon Stern was a friendly, intelligent man that helped his customers. He made the required medication via doctor’s orders but helped the patients understand how the prescription would help. He also was a man who never discussed their problems with anyone.
After his wife passed of diabetes, Augusta and Bess spent time after school helping out in the store.
This historical journey gives the reader a biography of Augusta’s life. It explains when she retired at age 70, her niece helped her relocate to Florida to a retirement home.
The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern will be published by St.Martin’s Publishing Group on October 08, 2024. I was able to read the ARC of Loigman’s recent novel via NetGalley. It was a pleasure to read her very pleasant story of Augusta and her family. Such a delightful journey into the 1920 era of life, then venturing into the 80s after her retirement. Two different worlds, yet many familiar faces. Be certain to pick up a copy of this well written novel. Do enjoy!

Wonderful story! Augusta Stern is a newly retired 80-year-old pharmacist living in a Florida retirement community when Irving Rivkin, her teenage lost love, appears at the pool. What unfolds is an ode to lost and found love, taking chances, and hope. I loved it!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the early read – the opinions expressed are my own. I strongly recommend this book. Loved it!

What a gem! This dual timeline novel with a hint of magical realism follows Augusta Stern as a teenager in the 1920s and as a retiree in the 1980s. Augusta is an unforgettable character, and I adored her engaging, heartwarming story.

Loved it!! This amazing book and an amazing story.and you just could not help but love Augusta and feel for Augusta! .
This story is set between two timelines, 1920’s Brooklyn and 1980’s Florida. Augusta and her story, keep you reading.
Jumping back to younger Augusta, we’re quickly thrown into her journey as she navigates the loss of her mother from diabetes. Wanting to help others in the way her own mother was unable to be helped at the time, she decides to follow in her father’s footsteps of becoming a pharmacist. Through all this, we also get the pleasure of meeting Great Aunt Esther. She not only introduces Augusta to the holistic side of medicine but also brings a bit of magic into play as well.

Jumping forward to older Augusta at a retirement home in Florida, the past quite literally runs (or in this case, swims) into the present. Irving was a delivery boy at her father’s drugstore in New York and also her first love. The second chance at love that Irving and Augusta are met with was like a cherry on top of an already beautiful story. The scenes in present time were too much fun to read!

Overall, I loved the story and how our pasts impact our future and you can see this both with Augusta and Irving and Esther. Their pasts a driver into the future and how one's life can change quickly based on 1 decision that was made for the good.

This book will make you laugh and cry at times. I could not put it down.

There is love, science, spells or magic, and relationship issues.

I jumped at the chance to read a second chance romance featuring characters in their eighties, and The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern did not disappoint. Dual timelines alternating between 1920s Brooklyn and 1980s Florida are woven together so seamlessly with threads of magical realism, feminism, and history.

When Augusta Stern is forced into retirement from the pharmacy job she has built her life around, she never expected to find the man who broke her heart sixty years ago living in the same Florida community. As a teenager she had used her Great Aunt Esther's magical elixir on her love Irving, only to disastrous results. Now he is suddenly back in her world, and Augusta must work through the humiliation over her teenage mistakes along with the anger she still holds against this man who has grown very much as a person.

This story flowed so well between the two timelines, with charming characters that you end up rooting for. I loved everything about Augusta: her insatiable curiosity, her drive to help others, her fierce independence in the face of all the obstacles she had to surmount as a woman going into a professional career during that time. The touches of magic passed down through generations of women in her family were so fun to read about; I loved the details of Great Aunt Esther's apothecary and rituals for healing.

I hadn't read any of this author's works before; now she will be a must-read.

Thank you so much to St. Martin's Press for this book!

A mixture of humor, friendship, family, and of course love; The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is a delight. Told from the perspective of dual timelines, as a young girl growing up in the 1920's, Augusta Stern yearns to follow in the footsteps of her pharmacist father in New York. As a recently retired pharmacist sixty years later, Augusta arrives into a retirement community in Florida and is immediately reunited with a character from her past she hasn't seen in over sixty years. This "chance" encounter left me turning the pages to discover what went wrong in the past to cause Augusta to dislike this reunion so much, but it also left me laughing out loud at the storytelling of events in the retirement community. The addition of Aunt Esther to Augusta's childhood timeline mixes in a bit of family tradition, the power of alternative medicinal healings, and perhaps a bit of magic. I really enjoyed this book and will highly recommend it to anyone looking for a funny, yet meaningful read on the power of healing and second chances in life. Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for the advanced copy, all opinions are my own. The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is out October 8th, and now is a great time to reserve your copy!

5 stars!
I am truly loving Lynda Cohen Loigman’s books now. In fact, I decided she is going to be an auto-buy author from now on.
The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is both sweet and poignant. A dual, now and then type of timeline that is plotted so smoothly it flows just as beautiful as the writing. A story of Augusta Stern- a pharmacologist and a healer who learned the best of the craft from her father who runs a pharmacy and her great-aunt Esther who was taught her the ins and outs of old-time healing practice. Augusta loves her work so much even if it meant to exchange her whole life around it. LCL always writes with loving Jewish touch and this one is no different because it just makes it even more heartwarming. I love the Florida retirement community setting. If the oldies have this much goody time, I am looking forward to my retirement years!
The last two paragraph summarizes the things I truly love from this book because like Augusta, I feel exactly the same.

“ She believed in medicine and in miracles. She believed in family and in love. She believed in the power of moonlight in kitchens, in the power of women, in the power of words. She believed that even on life’s darkest days, a bowl of chicken soup could offer comfort. She believed that the world still held a bit of magic for those who were patient and wise enough to wait.- Lynda Cohen Loigman.”

Special thank you to St.Martin’s Press via Netgalley and MacMillan Audio for the gifted copies in exchange of my honest review. Gabra Zackman gave Augusta the voice I did know I need and love in this book. It was a phenomenal narration and I could not be more happier! I highly recommend this read.

Dual timeline The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern by Lynda Cohen Loigman took my breath away and wowed me to the core. After reading it, my thoughts returned to the layered subtleties again and again.

In the 1920s, Augusta Stern's beloved mother died, leaving her and her sister Bess and their pharmacist father Solomon reeling. The teenage girls needed help and comfort which arrived in the form of their great aunt Esther. She was an indomitable force who admirably knew herself. Her cooking was phenomenal. But her apothecary cures were at times at odds with medicine and pharmaceutical care. She crossed the line when she encouraged Solomon's clients bypass him. They then developed an understanding of sorts. Augusta loved working with her father, learning about prescription drugs, client needs and keeping secrets. But she learned equally from.Esther. She became friends with delivery boy Irving.

Sixty years later, Augusta had retired from being a pharmacist and moved to a lovely senior's complex where she kept active physically and mentally. Soon after her past collided with her at the pool. Her emotions and struggles rose to the surface and she re-lived moments like they were yesterday. But she had gained wisdom and was no wilting violet.

There is so much to love about the novel. The writing is intelligent, original and witty. The author captured human nature extraordinarily well and beautifully. Very real emotions such as grief seep nto the words. Introspection and reflection into grief is realistic. Most characters are endearing, the kind I would enjoy being around. The mention of magic realism gave me pause as it is not something which pulls me in. But in this book mentions are fleeting and remind me more of faint wisps rather than heavy bricks. I love how the characters evolved and grew throughout. As a medical person, the mix of apothecary and pharmaceuticals caused me to swoon.

If you are contemplating this book even the tiniest bit, do not hesitate. It could be a favourite of the year as it is for me. I am smitten with it.

My sincere thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for providing me with a digital copy of this exceptional novel which warmed the cockles of my heart.

I feel like The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern was written just for me. As a single female pharmacist in her 40s, so much of this story was relatable to my own life story despite the timelines being so very different. Yes, this is a story of chance and missed opportunities. It is a love story of octogenarians. But for those of use in the profession. It is a love story of pharmacy and women's careers, and it is a story of sacrifices made and assumptions leading one astray. The mix of pharmacy history, herbalism, feminism, and magical realism just touched my soul. Augusta is like a little bit of me. It gives you hope that no matter where you are in life, something magical can change it for the good.

The fact that this book publishes during American Pharmacy Month makes it all the more special.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read and review this ARC.

I absolutely loved this author's prior book, 'The Matchmaker's Gift', so was excited when I saw this come out. It's a bit slow paced, as we first meet Augusta, a newly retired 80 year old trying to navigate her new life in a retirement community, where she reconnects with an old flame from her youth, Irving Rivkin. This encounter sparks a journey that flips between her present life and memories of her youth in 1920s Brooklyn, where her family owned a pharmacy and her great-aunt offered folk remedies, some of which had magical effects. Something happened in her past that is the reason why she never married or had children, something that takes awhile to reveal itself.

The dual timelines—Brooklyn in the 1920s and Boca Raton in the 1980s—are skillfully intertwined, showing Augusta’s journey of self-discovery across decades. The book explores how she navigates memories of her past and finds clarity in her present, hinting at themes of lost love, familial bonds, and feminism without being heavy-handed.

Loigman’s storytelling shines through its meticulous attention to historical detail and engaging character development. Augusta, in particular, stands out as a witty, strong, and independent woman, making her an unforgettable protagonist. The balance between mystery, romance, and magical elements makes the novel a delightful read. It's an uplifting and reflective book that challenges the notion that age limits personal growth or the capacity to experience love​. A bit similar to her prior book, where women with magical gifts change peoples lives for better or worse.

The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is a reflective and heartwarming tale that explores second chances, long-buried regrets, and the trials of aging with grace. Forced to retire from her beloved pharmacy job, Augusta relocates to a retirement community only to discover that her ex lover, Irving, also resides there. Confronted with the ghosts of her past, Augusta must face the unresolved heartache and missteps that derailed her life so many years before.

The story touches upon the struggles of women with careers to be respected even as late as the 1980’s. It’s also a story about relationships. It also highlights the fact that age is just a number and living in a retirement community can be anything but dull.

Marketed toward fans of The Lost Apothecary and Other Birds, two books that I myself enjoyed, this novel holds much promise with its themes of relationships and rediscovery. However, despite its intriguing premise, I found the narrative predictable and the character development lacking in depth. This absence of complexity made certain aspects of the plot feel contrived, diluting the emotional impact of the story.

While touches upon significant themes and delivers a pleasant read, it ultimately falls short for me. The cover however, is beautifully designed.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the ARC.