Thank you to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for an audio ARC of this book.

Right before her 80th birthday, Augusta Stern reluctantly retires from her career as a pharmacist and moves to a senior community in Florida. Once there, she learns that the man who broke her heart over sixty years ago, Irving Rivkin, also lives in the same community. Augusta has her guard up and tries to keep her distance from him, but he insists on befriending her. Augusta has wondered for the majority of her life what was it that went wrong between them and now she has the opportunity to finally find out.

This was a really enjoyable character driven novel. I enjoyed the time hop between present day and Augusta in the 1920’s and really liked Augusta as the main character. I was fascinated by her being torn between modern day medicine and Great Aunt Esther’s homeopathic remedies and seeing the value that each can bring to a patient. In modern day, the tough exterior that she puts on with Irving is such a front and I was dying to see what had happened between them in the past. I looked forward to picking up this book any chance I got.

This book worked really well on audio and I flew threw it. I personally did not like the voice that the narrator made for Augusta, for some reason it just didn’t fit. But otherwise, the narration was great and sound quality was excellent.

The author’s note made me like the book even more!

I absolutely adored this book. I listened to the audio version, and for two weeks I lived in the two worlds of Augusta Stern. I looked for connections, questioned decisions, and listened to her frustrations and fears—all through my headphones as I did my daily walking. I marred into a family with roots in both Augusta’s old and new neighborhoods, and as I listened, I thought of the family members I have come to know and love, and the stories I have heard. Before I even finished, I recommended the book to my mother-in-law, a woman who reminds me so much of Augusta.

I’m still thinking about the characters, and I plan to search out more works by this author. I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

✨I loved absolutely everything about this amazing book. It alternates between 1920s Brooklyn and a late 80s retirement community in Boca Raton with elements of historical fiction, lost dreams, lost love and even a pinch of magical realism. If you’re looking for a book to steal your heart, you’ve found out. It’s full of wit and charm and one of the best books I’ve read this year. DO NOT MISS THIS ONE!

🌿Read if you like:
✨Magical realism
✨Second chance romance
✨Familial love
✨Brooklyn settings
✨Florida settings
✨Dual timelines
✨Jewish rep
✨Found family
✨Strong female main characters
✨Historical fiction

🎧I listened to this book on audio, and the narration by Gabra Zackman @gabracadabranyc is absolutely stellar.

In a Nutshell: A dual-timeline narrative promising historical fiction, romance, and magical realism. The first is exceptional, the second is annoying, and the third is almost non-existent. It is not a bad book, but it is also not a very convincing book, at least in the contemporary timeline. That said, it is easy to see why a majority of readers are gushing over this tale. Mine is a slightly outlier review.

Plot Preview:
1987. Soon to turn eighty, Augusta Stern is forced to retire from her job as a hospital pharmacist. Single and unsure about what to do next, she joins an active retirement community in Florida. The last thing she expects here is to bump into Irving Rivkin, who worked in her father’s pharmacy as a delivery boy and had broken her heart sixty years ago. Augusta is determined not to allow Irving a second chance.
1920s. Brooklyn. Augusta Stern is determined to become a pharmacist some day and assist her father in his pharmacy. After her mother passes away, Great Aunt Esther moves into her nephew’s home to help. An iconoclast healer, Esther soon wins over some of the neighbours with her unconventional healing methods, much to the chagrin of her nephew and the fascination of Augusta. Now torn between pharmacy and alternate healing, Augusta has to decide if there is indeed any validity to Esther’s remedies. At the same time, she is also navigating a potential relationship with young Irving, which isn't as smooth as they thought it would be.
The story comes to us in the third person perspective of Augusta from the two timelines, with some random interludes from Irving and other characters.

PSA: The Goodreads blurb reveals too much.

Bookish Yays:
🌿 The setting of 1920s Brooklyn, with its lifestyle and atmosphere captured wonderfully. The plot highlights the Prohibition era, the gangs, the importance of pharmacists and the role of a traditional pharmacy, and close neighbourly bonds and friendships.
🌿 Esther – the best character of the book in terms of depth, complexity, and sensibility. She has a sense of mystery about her, which further adds to her charm.
🌿 The focus on girls in STEM in the historical timeline, and the challenges and discrimination faced by them. Gender roles come out brilliantly in this timeline.
🌿 The biased view against traditional healing as against allopathic and pharmaceutical knowledge. Coming from a country where traditional healing is at least as valued as allopathy, I found this arc amusing at times. Those who look down on natural remedies don’t know what they are missing.
🌿 The author's note, which really took me by surprise. I didn’t expect any actual people to be the basis of this plot, but they are!


Bookish Mixed Bags:
💊 Historical Augusta is a brilliant young girl who knows what she wants in life and isn’t afraid to chart the path not taken. Contemporary Augusta is rude and judgemental, though she is still intelligent and an achiever. The judgemental part, I could have done without.
💊 The historical timeline is way better in terms of plot, characters, as well as common sense. The contemporary timeline has no common sense, barely any plot, and immature characters. (Which is quite ironic considering the average character age in this timeline. More on this below.) The contemporary timeline drags the overall book down.
💊 The title tells us well in advance that the “love elixir” was prepared/used for/by Augusta Stern, but the mention of the elixir in Augusta’s context comes up only in the last quarter of the book. So the title is quite attractive but it also works as a semi-spoiler. That said, there are some sweet moments towards the end thanks to the titular potion.
💊 We see a couple of tiny glimpses of Jewish beliefs mostly thanks to Esther, but on the whole, there is hardly any Jewish feel to the plot despite the characters being predominantly of that faith. This could have been handled much better, especially in the historical timeline where the atmosphere was more true to life.

Bookish Nays:
💉 In Hindi, there’s an idiom: “budhaape mein doosra bachpana”, which roughly translates to: in old age, people live a second childhood by reverting to childish behaviour. Everyone main character in the 1987 timeline proves this adage. The issue isn’t with having a second-chance romance while in the eighties. But to see eighty-year-olds act like lovesick teenagers is annoying! Romance for the eighties age group cannot be written the same way as romance for characters in, say, their thirties or their fifties; the priorities of life are so different at each stage. But this book is so standard about the romance that the characters read like they were in their early twenties. After a while, I felt like I was reading a YA love triangle. (Yeah, love triangle! SMH!)
💉 On a related note: Would I really want to reunite with a man, even if he was the love of my teenage years, if he recognises me after 62 years saying “I’d know that *tuchus* anywhere!” Ugh!
💉 Moreover, the age depiction in the contemporary timeline is unrealistic. There is absolutely nothing to indicate that these were eighty-year-olds. I'm not saying that the characters should have been portrayed as senile or physically weak, but at least have some indicator of their age, either through their behaviour or through some physical ailments and aches. How is every single senior citizen in the book not just healthy but also thriving with peak physical fitness?
💉 There is no logical reason as to why “contemporary” is 1987, except that the historical timeline needed the Prohibition era, and the only way to ensure characters from that time were alive was to set the other timeline in 1987. There is absolutely nothing in this timeline to create the 80s atmosphere. No pop culture references, no 80s clothes or hairstyle hints,… Except for the obvious lack of digital tech, the timeline is generic.
💉 The miscommunication trope is overused in both timelines, but especially in the 1987 timeline.
💉 Augusta has had a long and fulfilling career and a loving relationship with the rest of her family, yet her companions consider her life incomplete because she had "no one to share her life with." Sheesh! Can we get rid of this antiquated idea?

🎧 The Audiobook Experience:
The audiobook, clocking at 9 hrs 40 min, is narrated by Gabra Zackman. Her voice didn’t particularly suit either timeline because she sounded too old for teen Augusta and too young for geriatric Augusta. But she deserves credit for keeping the two voices subtly different, helping us to keep the two timelines distinct. I also loved the way she expressed emotions realistically. Her overall performance was praiseworthy.
Plus points to the audio version for including the author’s note.

All in all, the historical timeline had more than enough meat to carry the novel successfully, but the juvenile behaviour in the 1987 timeline spoiled all the fun.
Do note that there’s barely any magical realism in the book. To be clear, the publishers have marked this only as historical fiction and women’s fiction. But several Goodreads reviewers have tagged this book under ‘Magical Realism’, which is incorrect. There is a minor thread of something inexplicable, but no magic as such. Merely using herbal remedies and chanting some prayers doesn’t indicate magical realism.
Recommended to those who enjoy a powerful historical narrative and dual timelines and don’t mind second-chance romances and geriatric characters acting like lovelorn hormonal teens.
3 stars, entirely for the historical timeline.

I really enjoyed The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern so much! It may well be my favorite book by Lynda Cohen Loigman so far, although I really enjoyed The Two-Family House, The Matchmaker’s Gift and The Wartime Sisters almost as much. In other words, I am a devoted fan of all of her books. The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern was written in a dual timeline. The chapters switched between Brooklyn during the early 1920’s and Florida in 1987. I always enjoy the way Lynda Cohen Loigman incorporates strong female characters into her book. She was able to accomplish that once again in The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern. I listened to the audiobook that was so well narrated by Gabra Zackman.

Augusta Stern was an older woman who was still working full time in 1987 as a pharmacist in a hospital. She enjoyed her work and couldn’t imagine herself not working. After all, Augusta had made her pharmacist career her true purpose in her life. Augusta had never married or had children so work was her passion. When a discrepancy in her age was discovered by the Human Resources Department at the hospital she worked for, Augusta was forced to initiate her own retirement. After all, Augusta was just months away from her eightieth birthday, instead of her seventieth birthday as she had made her employer and coworkers believe. With the help of her niece, Jackie, her older sister Bess’s daughter, Augusta found a two bedroom condominium in Florida in a retirement community called Rallentando Springs to retire in. Augusta made the move to Florida in the beginning of September in 1987, just a few weeks before her eightieth birthday which was on October third. That first morning at Rallentando Springs, Augusta decided to swim laps in her new condominium’s pool since that was something that she had gotten used to doing back in New York. As she made her way through her routine, she heard a voice that she had not heard in sixty something years. There was no mistaking it. The voice belonged to Irving Rivkin, Augusta’s first love. He was calling her Goldie, a childhood nickname that no one called her anymore.

Irving Rivkin had been the delivery boy at her father’s pharmacy. He had vanished from eighteen year old Augusta’s life in a blink of an eye. Augusta had been head over heels in love with him all those years ago. She had hoped that she and Irving would get engaged and marry but to Augusta’s shock and disappointment, Irving married Lois and left to live in Chicago. Augusta was brokenhearted. Now all these years later, Irving Rivkin was the last person Augusta wanted to see and to her dismay, he was living in the same retirement community as her. Was it fate or was she just being tormented once again by the coincidence of living in the same retirement community as Irving Rivkin?

Augusta Stern had grown up in Brownsville, Brooklyn. Her father, Solomon Stern was a pharmacist who owned Stern’s Pharmacy. Both the pharmacy and Solomon Stern had excellent reputations. The family which included Solomon, his wife Irene and their two daughters, Bess and Augusta lived above the store. From early on, both Bess and Augusta helped out at the pharmacy with simple tasks like dusting the shelves and arranging the stock. Augusta always took a more serious interest than her older sister in the prescriptions and the advise her father gave to his customers. When Augusta was only fourteen years old, her mother died from diabetes. Insulin had yet to be discovered and used as a treatment for diabetes. Around this time, Solomon Stern hired Irving Rivkin to deliver orders to the pharmacy’s customers.

Six months after Augusta and Bess lost their beloved mother, their great aunt Esther came to live with the Sterns. Augusta resented her great aunt Esther at first. She and Bess who had always shared a room were forced to separate. Their mother’s sewing room became Bess’s new bedroom and Augusta now shared a bedroom with her aunt. As time progressed, Augusta and Irving developed feelings for one another and fell hopelessly in love. Augusta learned about the unique healing abilities her great aunt Esther possessed and Augusta wanted more than anything to become a pharmacist like her father. She came to love, admire and respect her great aunt Esther. Augusta’s great aunt Esther gave her the nickname of Goldie. It was Augusta’s belief, that she was capable of combining the teachings of her great aunt with the traditional ways of her father to become a successful woman pharmacist that was able to provide cures for many. Before Augusta was able to test her theory, her world fell apart. Irving Rivkin left Brooklyn to marry Lois and her great aunt Esther died.

The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern was everything I have come to expect from a book written by Lynda Cohen Loigman. It was captivating from start to finish. I adored the characters of Augusta and her great aunt. Augusta was strong, intelligent, determined and living before her times. It was quite unusual for women to become pharmacists in the 1920’s. She was met by opposition from male customers who did not trust her ability to fill their prescriptions correctly. I admired her father who stood up for Augusta and finally came to respect her and believe in her. The mention of great aunt Esther’s chicken soup and kreplach brought back fond memories of my grandmother’s soup and kreplach. My grandmother, like Esther, didn’t measure or use recipes for most of her cooking. It was always a pinch of this and a little of that. The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern was about second chances, family, ambitions, healers, trust, loss, love and friendship. If you enjoy historical fiction that is mixed with a little romance and magical realism then I highly recommend you read The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern ny Lynda Cohen Loigman.

Thank you to Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to the audiobook of The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern by Lynda Cohen Loigman through Netgalley in exchange for a honest review.

Loigman does it again bringing the reader into the world of Augusta Stern, the heartache, growth, loss, love, grief, and acceptance of how life brings a roller coaster of emotions and relationships. Fabulous read I will certainly recommend to others!

Very few novels are from the perspective of older adults and even fewer show them engaging in active, romantic lifestyles. This novel focuses on lost love and miscommunication, not the old trope of elderly people with aches, pains, and memory loss. The novel flips back and forth between the past and the present, and even between narrators. This shouldn't keep you from picking it up. The story flows clearly and well as the tale unfolds. I loved the dynamic between the romantic leads and the idea that it's never too late for second chances. This was a charming book and I'm looking forward to reading Loigman's previous novels.

"The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern" is a captivating historical fiction novel that explores the complexities of love and loss. The story's unique settings and richly drawn characters create a compelling narrative that will leave readers yearning for more. While the pacing could benefit from a bit more momentum in certain sections, the overall themes of love and the enduring nature of human connection are beautifully explored.

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ Loved this historical fiction love story. The tale is told in past and present format from 1926 to 1987. Augusta Stern is working in her father‘s drugstore where he’s the pharmacist. Augusta is dating and in love with the delivery boy Irving. In her mind they will marry, but Irving breaks her heart by abruptly running away to marry another girl. Afterwords she throws herself into her studies and work as a pharmacist. Now, at the age of 80, she is forced to retire and settles in Florida. Lo and behold the love of her life lives in the same community. What will she uncover about her past with Irving and what could the future hold? Excellent audio narration!! Thank you @netgalley @macmillan.audio for the ARC now available. #macaudio2024 #netgalley #netgalleyreviewer

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Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this Audio ARC Copy!

This story was so cute I just loved every minute of it. Augusta is such a strong character and I loved seeing her as a young girl, as well as seeing her reflect on her years working as a pharmacist and hiding from love. After being forced to retire Augusta moves to a retirement community and runs into not just one but two friends from her past which stirs up a lot of memories and feelings. Such a sweet and lovely story.

What a charming, heartwarming and delightful read! The main character is 80-year-old Augusta, who has recently retired from her career as a pharmacist and moved to Florida. Amazingly, in the same retirement complex into which she has moved is Irving, a former boyfriend of hers and the love of her life whom she has not seen in 60+ years. their stories are told in alternating timelines, the 1920s and 1987, and through them the reader is able to discover the answer to many questions — including why their relationship fell apart all those years ago and what happened to them in the ensuing years. This is truly a story of love and second chances, even a second chance that comes along decades later. And, although I am not really into magical realism, the storyline here only contained a bit and it actually helped enhance the plot. All in all, this was definitely an enjoyable novel.

I loved this book with my whole dumb heart.

First off, I love that the MCs are ‘of an age’. As much as I love Romantasy, I’m over 24-year-old characters, whose brains aren’t fully cooked, yet are tasked with saving the world.

I loved the reverse Grumpy Sunshine trope, ‘though Augusta is less Grump and more ZERO NONSENSE.

The dual timelines was lovely. Some books require you to make a detailed red-thread board, but this author filled in knowledge gaps clearly and concisely.

The two settings were fantastic. 1920s Jewish Brooklyn and 1980s Seniors’ Florida were both vibrant in a way my brain translated into music.

The interplay between ‘modern’ and ‘traditional’ medicine was super-interesting. I loved how the author didn’t land on one or the other as ‘better’ but sat firmly on the fence.

The only thing I didn’t like, was all the non-communication (The Miscommunication Trope’s bastard cousin). Y’all need to read some Brene Brown and TALK TO EACH OTHER.

I had thought The Matchmaker’s Gift was this author’s only other book. Can’t wait to track the other two previous works down.

Thanks to NetGalley, St Martin’s Press, and Macmillan Audio for this fantastic ARC.

Using two timelines, the 1920s and the 1980s, author Lynda Cohen Loigman tells a compelling tale of starting over and second chances.

At the novel's open in 1987, Augusta at a spry 80-years-old is forced to retire from her job at a hospital. Feeling upset and at loose ends, she decides to move to a condo in a small retirement community that her niece Jackie found for her in Florida. Augusta is a woman who likes her routines and plans, and has no desire to change once she moves to her new apartment. She is horrified and experiences a rush of emotions when she discovers that her old flame Irving is living in the same condo. Despite doing her best to avoid him, she is forced to begin to confront memories of her adolescence.

Teenaged Augusta and her sister Bess and their father Solomon lived in together in Brooklyn in the 1920s. Augusta looked up to her pharmacist father, Solomon Stern, who was a respected and trusted figure in their neighbourhood, and Augusta yearned to learn how to be a pharmacist, just like him.

After Augusta's mother died from diabetes, and Solomon was unable to do anything to prevent it, he fell into a depression. Then, Augusta's great aunt Esther moved in with them. Esther, though not a pharmacist, had her own cures for situations, and Augusta was drawn to the woman, even while Solomon fumed that his authority was being undermined every time someone asked Esther for one of her treatments, such as something as seemingly benign as soup, or an order to wear boots instead of high heels.

Though Solomon was mired in grief, he reluctantly allowed Augusta to learn a little from him, and she chose to learn from Esther. Augusta also became fascinated, and later fell for, her father's delivery boy Irving, a kind person who was equally enamoured with her. Their lives together seemed a given, but something sent them off in separate directions. Augusta was convinced it was her misuse of one of Esther's concoctions, and consequently refused to countenance anything but medically-approved drugs, rather than Esther's homemade cures. Augusta also never found anyone to spend her life with, but had a wonderful relationship with her beloved niece Jackie.

The author does a great job of bringing the two timelines and their many characters to life, though I will confess to enjoying the 1987 period a little more, probably because we see the professionally successful and personally lonely Augusta get a chance to change her life.

I loved the way Augusta and Irving did eventually find their way back into each other's lives, and Augusta finally began to open herself up to new relationships and friendships. There is plenty of sadness and humour throughout the story, and much as I liked Augusta and enjoyed her gradual transformation, proving that it's never too late to embrace new things in life, I loved some of the side characters, particularly Esther, whose homespun treatments could have been just sensible, or could have been a touch magical? Either way, this was an enjoyable story, and I'm interested in checking out other works by this author.

I went back and forth between the text and the audio, and greatly enjoyed the talented voice work of Gabra Zackman, who injects emotion into every character, bringing each alive with humour and compassion.

Thank you to Netgalley and to St. Martin’s Press and Macmillan Audio for these ARCs in exchange for my review.

I enjoyed this cozy little romance story. I enjoyed the dual timelines going back and forth between the 1920's and 1980's.
I didn't love how the "misunderstanding/ miscommunication" trope of this played out fully. You really had to suspend belief with the story, but overall I thought it was well done.
The narrator did a wonderful job. I really enjoyed listening to this story.
Overall, I thought this was a heartwarming, cute little love story.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC. This is one of my favorite books of the year, if not my favorite. It deserves all the stars!

Of all the retirement communities in all the world, you walk into mine… What a beautiful story! Told in duel timelines, we learn about Augusta Stern in 1987 as an almost 80 year old woman and as a young woman coming into her own in 1922. This book has it all, humor, sorrow, family dynamics, misunderstandings, first loves reunited, gangsters, and homeopathic remedies. This story warmed my heart and reminded me it’s never too late to reclaim your youth.

Thank you Lynda Cohen Loigman, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this audiobook! The sound quality was great, and the narrator, Gabra Zackman, did an excellent job bringing the characters to life. I like how she differentiated between young Augusta and older Augusta. Lynda Cohen Loigman did a nice job narrating the author’s note and acknowledgments at the end. I enjoy hearing about the real life inspiration for stories and characters!

In The Love Elixier of Augusta Stern, in the late 1980s, an 80 year old woman, Augusta, is forced into retirement and relocates to a Florida. In her community, she is reunited with her first love as a teenager so the story flips back and forth between the 1920s in Brooklyn and the 1980s. And the 1920s was Augusta’s life with her dad, sister and her aunt who had homemade remedies to heal all the ailments of their neighbors. I loved every second of this book. I loved the magical realism. I loved the back and forth with the timelines. I loved the retirement community folks. I loved seeing Augusta mature and stand up for herself. I laughed out loud so many times. A true delight to read.

I had no idea what to expect with this book, but it's a beautiful story. Dual timeline between the 1920s and the 1980s - an incredible atmospheric read with lovable characters who get a second chance at love and companionship 60 years after their original ill-fated love story. The different aspects of 1920s pharmacy, old-world healing, and later in life retirement communities is unique but also works very well in this story. The authors note was incredible and shed a lot of light on the thought process and inspirations that brought this story to life.

Overall, this is a very heartwarming tale - it traces the mistakes that we make and the redemption and second chances/new beginnings that can happen later in life. The dual timelines were well paced and brought the story to life in both 1920s NYC and 1980s Florida. I loved that they all ended up at the same retirement community - and the shenanigans that they got into were amusing and humorous to imagine. While there is a great deal of imagination that brought this story to life, you can feel the underpinnings of real people and historically accurate context that anchors the story to make it believable.

I loved the characters in this book - they were so well rounded and defined. Even the supporting characters all made sense and helped to give the story extra depth. I enjoyed the audio version of this book - the narrator did a great job bringing the story and the characters to life while injecting some energy and dynamics into her voice. This book definitely gave me all the cozy, fall vibes and is perfect for this time of year!

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillain Audio for the ALC of this book to read.

I wanted to read this because I thought the cover was really pretty. Honestly, I thought it would be similar to The Lost Apothecary or something along those lines. I was very wrong. This was its own work of art. I never thought I would be cheering on a romance among 80 year olds- I prefer a younger crowd, but here I was hanging on every word. This was a spellbinding, wonderfully written tale. I got caught up in both the past and present aspects of this read and could not put it down. If you are looking for a captivating historical fiction story, look no further.

Thanks to NetGalley for giving me a copy of this audiobook!

This audiobook was full of whimsy and packed full of emotions, and I didn’t want to stop! I was hooked in right away and didn’t want to put it down.