Thanks to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for this copy of "The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt."

With a title like that (mysterious and magical), this book definitely delivered with a captivating gothic tale.

Harriet has lived her whole life in fear of her father, but he's vanished and she's alone in the Sunnyside house with her garden that responds to her and protects her.

But when a police inspector starts to ask about Harriet's missing father, she realizes how dangerous it can be for a female with no money and no rights (it's 1865).

So what happened to Harriet's mother and why does she feel responsible? And what are the mysterious letters she keeps receiving about a family secret? And why did I feel a little squeamish about the charming suitor who wants a hasty courtship?

Fantastic ending - I was cheering for Harriet! (I won't spoil it for you but let me know if you read it.)

Chelsea Iversen’s The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt is a whimsical and heartwarming tale that weaves together themes of resilience, community, and the magic of nature. This enchanting novel offers a delightful escape into a world where the unexpected blooms, and the beauty of connection thrives amidst challenges.

The story centers around Harriet Hunt, an unassuming gardener with an extraordinary gift: the ability to grow plants that reflect the emotions and memories of those around her. When a sudden tragedy strikes her close-knit village, Harriet's peculiar garden becomes a beacon of hope and healing, sparking curiosity and drawing people together in ways they never imagined.

Iversen’s prose is lyrical, painting vivid imagery of Harriet’s vibrant garden. The descriptions of the plants, each uniquely tied to the characters’ inner worlds, are stunningly imaginative. From a sorrowful willow dripping crystalline dew to jubilant sunflowers that hum faint melodies, the garden feels alive, almost like a character in its own right. The lush and fantastical setting is balanced by the book's emotional depth, exploring themes of grief, forgiveness, and rediscovering joy.

The character of Harriet is particularly compelling. Her quiet strength and humility make her a relatable and endearing protagonist. As she navigates her own grief while tending to the emotions of others, readers witness her growth and bravery in embracing her gift. The supporting cast, from the cynical shopkeeper to the inquisitive child who befriends Harriet, adds layers of humor and poignancy to the narrative.

While the story leans heavily on its magical realism, it also resonates with deeply human struggles. At its heart, the novel is a reminder of the power of small, meaningful gestures and the way community can provide solace in turbulent times.

If there’s any critique to be made, it’s that some subplots could have been more developed. A few characters’ arcs feel rushed, leaving readers wanting to know more about their backstories and connections to the garden. Nevertheless, the charm and originality of the narrative more than make up for these minor shortcomings.

The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt is an evocative and beautifully crafted novel that invites readers to slow down and appreciate the magic hidden in everyday life. Fans of magical realism and character-driven stories will find themselves utterly captivated.

This book starts slow with Harriet living with her mean neglectful father and then he disappears. Harriet is left alone in her manor with her magical garden. Luckily she has her cousin Eunice who is recently married and with child.
The police are investigating her father's disappearance.

This book was fantastic I loved the magical garden and how it took care of Harriet. The writing was beautiful. The book was unique. I really enjoyed it.

I loved reading this and honestly couldn't put it down once I started! Harriet Hunt has been a victim of many unfortunate events throughout her life, and finds solace in her garden. Parts of the story were so difficult to read because I just didn't want her to endure any more hardships! Harriet was such a strong FMC and I'm so thankful I was able to read her story.

*3.5 Stars. I enjoyed this but I felt due to the pacing I wasn’t always able to read it for a long time or wanted to pick it up. I really loved our MC Harriet and her connection to nature. I loved getting to explore her magic and how it evolved throughout the story. I have to say that this book made me yet again want to throw hands with fictional men. I absolutely HATED some of the men in this book but I’m thrilled they got exactly what they deserved. I’m so happy Harriet got her happy ending because she really went through so much in this book. I have to say I really loved the inclusion of female friendships in this book, I adored her relationship with Eunice and Amelia. My main complaints really about this book was the pacing of the story, the last 1/3 of the book was so good with the twists and turns but I found the first 2/3 drug a bit.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. “The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt” is now available for purchase.

I’m particularly impressed by books that manage to be both cozy and harrowing, and this one does an exceptional job at both.

There’s a menace to this story that comes both at and from the protagonist, an interesting dichotomy between the men seeking to control and use her and the way she controls the garden. As things get progressively worse for Harriet, her connection to the plants also gets wilder, and it’s interesting to see how these things come together repeatedly throughout the story and most meaningfully in its conclusion.

The setting here is very well rendered, and the atmosphere feels alternately snug and oppressive depending on what is happening at the moment in the story. I really liked how the author used sense of place here to amplify the emotion of the plot and its central character.

I loved this book.

I'm a huge fan of magical realism and fantasy fiction so this was a book description that really spoke to me when I saw it. I loved Harriet. She was a vulnerable character, and her garden is her backbone in a way. I felt like her world was small yet so big to read through. I will say at first this was a book that was hard to get into but once I did, I really liked spending time with Harriet in her garden.

I think this would make a fantastic book club book, because there's so much character development to discuss throughout. At the end of the novel, I was a little sad to leave Harriet behind.

Wow what a crazy read! Not at all what I was expecting, a bit slow in some parts but well worth it for that ending. I love a female rage book especially one with a magical cottagecore element mixed in-- I was hooked. Everything about this book was SUPER atmospheric! Has a lot of dark and whimsical garden vibes--definitely for fans of Weyward and the TV show Buccaneers. Thank you NetGalley for the digital ARC! :)

This book started out so promising. I loved the wild garden; however, I got to the middle of this book and just did not care about the characters or what was happening with the plot. The main character, Harriet, was too much of a pushover for my liking. Therefore, I decided not to finish this book at the 50% mark.

DNF at the end of Chapter 5. Unfortunately this book seems entirely focused on telling a story about all the ways that women can be vulnerable and abused during this time period, and while I don’t like my books to pretend like things were hunky-dory for women in history, I’m also not keen to dwell on them for what feels like it will be the entire novel.

This was such a beautifully written story of overcoming. Harriet has been beaten down her entire life and yet she is the most tender yet resilient bloom in the garden. This wrapped up in the most wonderful and fulfilling way.

This book, unfortunately, didn't hit the mark for me.

I kind of expected female empowerment, a magical garden, and a main character who is a bit of a social recluse, by choice. What we get instead is a lot of abuse of the female characters in the story, a garden with unclear magic, and a bit of a doormat main character who pines for more, but doesn't take action.

I think this book could've been cut back a lot. Everything is so painstakingly snail-paced. It takes so long for the story to get anywhere, and it's overly wordy. I'm a lover of a slow burn, but so much of this book felt like filler. The characters don't do anything, and the story just unfolds around them. They aren't dynamic, and they all fall very flat. The plot lines felt weak to me; there are quite a few incidences where the driving factor of the plot is just an irrational dislike of our main character. The story relies a lot on a historical - victorian - plot line of women being labelled hysterical by male figures in their lives, but it just didn't feel convincing here.

Almost all of the male characters are just terrible for no reason, and almost all of the female characters just revolve around that terribleness. Harriet (our FMC) has so many nudges in the right direction, and she just gives up again and again, but it feels like it is just to drive the plot forward. There's also an attempted SA that feels very brushed off while also being a driving factor for the plot. The book is marketed as Harriet learning to harness the power of her garden, but she mostly ignores it, wills it to be tame, and then simply runs away when the going gets tough... and relies on her garden to save her.

Overall, the garden was pretty cool. Some of the resolutions felt satisfying. I do like how the author writes, and I liked some of the concepts. I just think that this story wasn't well executed, and I often felt bored while reading because I couldn't get attached to the characters or plot.

𝓣𝓱𝓪𝓷𝓴 𝔂𝓸𝓾 𝓽𝓸 𝓝𝓮𝓽𝓰𝓪𝓵𝓵𝓮𝔂 𝓪𝓷𝓭 𝓢𝓸𝓾𝓻𝓬𝓮𝓫𝓸𝓸𝓴𝓼 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓪𝓷 𝓐𝓡𝓒 𝓬𝓸𝓹𝔂 𝓸𝓯 𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓼 𝓫𝓸𝓸𝓴, 𝓲𝓷 𝓮𝔁𝓬𝓱𝓪𝓷𝓰𝓮 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓶𝔂 𝓱𝓸𝓷𝓮𝓼𝓽 𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓮𝔀.

I want to start by saying I've seen book marketing that classes The Peculiar Garden Of Harriet Hunt as cosy fantasy, and it's not that. Please check trigger warnings for domestic violence and SA before you read this one.
Centred around Harriet, our main protagonist, who must use her magical ability with plants to save herself from the ill-intentions from the men around her, this is an enchanting and magical story
Harriet is all alone after her abusive father disappeared, leaving his debts behind. The only company Harriet has is her garden, which responds to her emotions. Deemed too peculiar for victorian society, Harriet prefers the solace of the crumbling walls of Sunnyside house.
When suspicion grows around the disappearance of her father and whether Harriet is involved, she marries a charming man to help protect her, but looks can be deceiving, and she may have just unwillingly drawn herself into an even more dangerous situation.

I was immediately captivated by Harriet's story and felt great empathy for her. She's not had an easy life at all, and as a reader, I wanted to see her break free of the abuse she's suffered desperately.
I loved the magical elements in this book, and the imagery of the garden was written beautifully. There's plenty of twists and turns in the plot, and I didn't anticipate the ending at all, which I always love. The ending was also brilliant, and I love it when you finish a book and feel satisfied, which this one gave. Overall, I really enjoyed this one and would recommend it if you like historical fiction with a dash of magic. It's very readable and I would be interested in reading more by Chelsea in the future.

Although in the end, all of the loose ends in this story were neatly tied up, getting to that point was quite difficult. To start, there were too many plot lines going on and rarely were they ever really explained. Harriet Hunt is a woman who is alone in the world. Her father is missing, her only friend is moving away, her mother died when she was young. Her freedom (and loneliness) takes a turn when an inspector shows up at her door asking about her missing father. Harriet decides to take it upon herself to find him and get the inspector out of her life and this is when the story truly begins. The reader is introduced to the missing father plotline immediately, but all we know is that he’s gone. Then there’s a random man who proposes to her within about 2 hours of them knowing each other. This is weird and not really explained. We learn that Harriet’s mother died in a terrible accident that had something to do with Harriet herself, but that’s all we know and it really isn’t explained. There are some odd letters arriving from a man named Nigel Davies, but the letters explain very little nothing comes of them until the last fifteen pages of the book.
On top of the multitude of shallowly explained plot lines, the main character is annoying. She makes rash decisions and takes a “woe is me” approach to everything she encounters. If she had taken the opportunity presented to her by Eunice at the beginning of the story, the rest of it would have never happened. She makes excuses for her husband’s abuse, at one point describing it as “erratic behavior” and tells herself she deserves it for what happened to her mom (which is still unclear to the reader) years ago. There wasn’t one point in this book where I thought Harriet was standing up for herself or making decisions in her best interest.
She also was clearly not socialized as a child because ANY and ALL situations in which she needed to have a conversation with someone, it looked like this: *character says something to her* “Harriet had no idea what to say, so she said nothing.”, “Harriet tried to think of something interesting or cool to say and couldn’t so she said nothing.”
Annoying.
The reason I’m giving this two stars is because everything ended up being tied up and there was a twist that I didn’t see coming at the end.
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC and my sincerest apologies that I am so bad about reviewing things on time. :,)

This book starts out with a newspaper article detailing the disappearance of one Christian Comstock and his wife. Where have they gone? What has happened to them? To answer these questions, we must hit the rewind button and begin six months earlier. That's the set up for what turns out to be a novel with a very interesting concept. A lonely woman, a missing father, a once luxurious house now barren of extravagances, and, we mustn't forget, a wild garden that is far more than it seems; these are the elements that make up the center of a twisting, turning plot line. Are you intrigued? If so, I encourage you to travel with Harriet Hunt through her garden to discover its mysteries and its secrets, but don't let your guard down or you just might be in for a surprise.

2.5 ⭐️

This fantastical mystery felt as if it struggled to find its flow, seemingly lacking direction. I pushed through the slow beginning as I wanted to make sure I gave myself ample time to get pulled into the story, but, admittedly, I contemplated DNFing it about half way through as it still felt like it was dragging it's feet. Understanding that perhaps this book just wasn't my speed/wheelhouse, I tried to move forward with an open mind. Sadly, I don't feel that was entirely the issue.

Much of the story could have possibly been condensed. Most notably her childhood recollections. There were moments that I felt moved the story along rather well, but they almost felt rushed and out of rhythm with the rest of the story.

While I really wanted the main issue to be that this book just wasn't for me, I truly think it could have benefited from some better editing.

When I attended Holly Black’s book tour earlier this year, she shared that Wren, her main character in The Prisoner’s Throne series, was hard to write because she wouldn’t “protag.” Meaning that Wren did not want to participate in the events unfolding around her, which made her a very interesting character to follow. Well, I have another book for you that features a leading lady who also wants to remove herself from the narrative. This time, there’s a young Victorian woman who would much rather stay at home than participate in the patriarchal world showcased in Chelsea Iversen’s novel, The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt.

Harriet Hunt’s father has gone missing, so she takes full advantage of the freedom his absence grants her. That doesn’t mean she walks the neighborhood or fills her social calendar, Harriet was never allowed such frivolities growing up at Sunnyside. Instead, she entombs herself in the dreary home, tending to her garden and welcoming the infrequent visits from her cousin. But when an inspector begins to question Harriet about her father’s disappearance, she realizes how vulnerable she is. Harriet is desperate to find a way to prove her innocence and with few options granted to an unchaperoned young woman, Harriet will place her trust in the people who begin to take an interest in her, for better or for worse.

There’s a lot of mystery to uncover in Harriet’s story. Her father has disappeared, the circumstances around her mother’s death are unknown, a strange man seems adamant in courting her, and the garden is alive and attuned to Harriet. The details surrounding these mysteries are revealed at a snail’s pace, and most, if not all, of the answers arrive in one big explosion at the end of the story. By the time these details were revealed, I had lost interest in the mysteries completely because so little was shared for the first 80% of the story that I had to shift my focus to Harriet’s survival instead. I also would have loved way more exposition on Harriet’s connection with the garden. It was such a central part of the story, but it’s not fully explored in a meaningful way. The mysteries hovered around the edges of this story, and instead, the focus stays on our shy protagonist navigating the worst nightmare possible.

At first, I was frustrated by Harriet’s inaction throughout this story. She is not a dynamic protagonist, and she meets most of the events unfolding around her with a grim, resolute acceptance. The horrors keep happening to a dispirited protagonist, who is not a grab-a-bull-by-the-horns type of character. Harriet’s situation is horrible, and I was suffocating under the constraints of her life as things kept getting worse. Eventually, I realized that her lack of action did a wonderful job of exacerbating the lack of control in her own life for the reader. I grew frustrated with Harriet’s inability to make a move, but it made me feel the helplessness that Harriet was experiencing. As a woman in Victorian England, her world was determined and controlled by the men in her family, so she truly did not have many options to save herself from the nightmare. I came to appreciate our more reserved protagonist who did not make the waves herself but found ways to seize an opportunity in the openings that were created for her.

The Peculiar Garden likes to play around with the illusion of safety and the things, or people, we think will keep us safe. Harriet searches externally for her safety, which places the power and control in the hands of those outside forces. Her response to fear rids herself of all agency and she loses so much of herself along the way. Harriet kept her social circle so small, it only allowed that fear to fester and turn on her. It effectively kept her isolated while also making her vulnerable to kindness of any sort. She’s not the big, bold protagonist found in most stories, but I like the way Iversen develops Harriet in her own quiet way to conquer her fears.

The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt takes on the personality of its timid protagonist. Instead of flash or daring, it displays the quiet calm in the eye of Harriet’s storm and her strength to withstand it all.

Rating: The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt - 6.5/10

I ended up DNF-ing this book. The cover and description made it appear to be a cozy fantasy. This felt like grimy depressive Victoria horror without the horror. It's a book filled with trauma and depression. This just wasn't for me. It was written well but it was not something I wanted to finish nor did I care what happened.

While it a bit of a rollercoaster, it was an interesting book that kept me wanting to know more. I will admit, it started off quite slow and left me a bit worried for if it would keep my attention, but it surprised me. The last handful of chapters happen quick and really pick up the pace, which I appreciated.

I do really appreciate Harriet's character and the development. How we see her really go from a naive young women to a confident one who learns how to immerse herself into society regardless of her past. It of course is infuriating watching her go through all the abuse she has endured and constantly ask yourself why doesn't she just leave to go live with Eunice and why not sooner? But, I think that part really shows you how hard it is for people to leave abuse and or not realize how much time has passed them by with all the manipulation they have endured.

Botanical gothic horror blooms into a freely flourishing garden. What an absolute delight The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt is. It's both a historical mystery with magical realism and a story about freedom and embracing your true self. And while it initially feels more like a spooky season read, it's one to pick up now.

Set in Victorian small village England, Chelsea Iversen has selected specific details anchoring it there, notably a man's ability to involuntarily commit his wife or child to an asylum. (It otherwise didn't feel particularly English to me). Harriet as a young woman is a neighborhood oddity and recluse, lonely, and captive in her father's house, after the death of her mother. She's always had a unique relationship with the garden, and it too, is part of the reason she can't leave even after her father goes missing. With debts mounting, Harriet decides she needs to find out what happened to him, even as she recognizes she doesn't really have the social skills for such an investigation.

While there are some very dark turns in this book, it's Harriet's journey and her discovery that she's really not alone that makes it such a worthwhile read. If I say any more than that, I'll spoil it. If you enjoy gothic horror, mysteries and a little magical realism, check out The Peculiar Garden of Harriet Hunt.

CW: domestic abuse, child neglect