The Haywoods are a family able to make certain kinds of magic specifically by using plants and herbs. They take care of the residents of Yarrow. While sadness is necessary in life, it can also become overbearing. These are the times that the Haywoods are able to help by "plucking" the roots of the sorrow out of the person who needs help. They do not take all of the sadness at once, but little bits over time. It's a gentle easing of a person's grief. These emotions are then given to the dirt of the Shadow Garden, causing an abundance of healthy growth. The Bonner family distills bourbon from the corn seeds that they originally bought from the Haywood family. Their bourbon can cause you to forget, and once a year this particular bourbon is offered at a festival. The Bonners have taken away some of the Haywood's business because many people would rather completely forget an undesirable memory than have it plucked gently over time from their hearts. The Bonners harbor many secrets and the two families are rivals that do not care for each other. The magic in the book is truly unique. Mixed in is love, a mystery and death--the book has a lot going on. Perhaps too much, which is the reason for my 3.5 star review. I became confused while reading the book due to the large family and the author giving everyone a large part in the novel. It took a lot of thinking on my part, remembering who, what and where. There is a family tree in the beginning that was helpful and I am grateful for that. Truly some imaginative work on the author's part.
Thank you to NetGalley and Forever Hachette Book Group for the DRC in exchange for an honest review.

The Haywood and Bonner are rival families that have lived in Yarrow, Kentucky for many years. The shadow garden has magical powers and people seek it out for many reasons. Twenty years ago, the town forgot that summer. This book tells the tale of what happens when the memories start to return!

Bourbon magic that makes you forget? Yes, please! This magical story of family and love and loss weaves together multiple view points to piece together the mystery of what happened the summer of 1997--a summer an entire Kentucky town has forgotten. The cast of strong female characters bonded together by their family legacy and friendship drive this mystery to a satisfying conclusion.

I really enjoyed the different genres that were pulled into this book - from the fantasy of magic to the mystery and suspense I found this book ticked a lot of boxes for me!

I was excited to read this and it did not disappoint! I think one of the neat things was that the book took place in the South and that was such a unique thing to read about as well!

In the Shadow Garden was an interesting book, but it didn’t capture me the way I wanted it to. I liked but didn’t love the characters and I actually felt like there were too many of them- Quinn and Harper seemed unnecessary and then I was temporarily confused about who was married to Nolan, the one who’d be dead for over 20 years I know this seems silly, but it felt like there were a lot of Hayward’s and not very many Bonner’s.

The concept of magic and memories in the garden and the bourbon was again, interesting, but somehow failed to really capture me. While I was invested in the story and curious about how it would resolve itself, I never felt fully hooked.

I will say that, from a psychological perspective, I can’t imagine losing my memories and/or having them tampered with.

In the Shadow Garden by Liz Parker, 4 stars.
This book is the perfect way to spend a summer afternoon. It reads quickly and has an interesting premise. However, I didn’t really feel myself connecting with any of the characters. The book is told from multiple points of view and I think it was just too many. It didn’t allow me to connect with anyone,
I recommend this book for anyone who likes books with magic, strong female characters, and small towns.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for my review.

First of all: the cover for this book is absolutely gorgeous. I'm in awe. I preordered this book because I need it on my shelves.

Secondly: what's between the covers is equally gorgeous. We have a multigenerational story about (mostly) women as they sort through all of their trauma, most of which they don't even remember the source of. The descriptions of the shadow garden and grief and summertime in Kentucky were all lush and beautiful. And by the end, I was a complete and utter mess because I just had so many feelings all at once.

Thank you to Grand Central Publishing for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was really excited to read this book. I had heard such good things. I did enjoy a lot of it - I loved the characters and their relationships, the descriptions of the plants and their various healing properties, the tea leaf readings and the magical powers of the Haywood family. I could see the Shadow Garden come to life and feel its powers.

Unfortunately, about halfway through the book, I started to get bored. I was still interested in the plot, but I lost connection with the characters. They didn't seem to grow in any meaningful way that I could relate to. They became caricatures reacting to situations, and I felt like I was watching from the sidelines.

Thank you to NetGalley for an opportunity to read an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

“There were two things every Haywood woman knew: never trust a Bonner, and always trust the leaves.”

I really liked this book. The story is told through the perspectives and memories of several different characters, including the shadow garden itself. I appreciated this choice as it made the overall narrative feel like it belonged to the entire Haywood extended family and not just Addison or Irene or Kaden.

The book grapples a lot with the idea of healing, particularly after traumatic experiences, and what may or may not be the best course to move forward. The Bonners offer people the chance to completely remove a single memory once a year. The Haywoods prefer a more gradual approach in which they gently extract emotions like pain and grief at the root, then feed those feelings to their shadow garden. In return, the garden yields produce that carries the impression of those emotions.

I thought the magic system was really interesting. The Haywood family’s gift is completely related to plants and the shadow garden. Their primary power is to weed negative emotions from people’s hearts so that positive ones have room to grow. They read tea leave leaves when seeking guidance and they can see people’s auras as flowers.

In love. I am in love with this book.

The magic. The mystery. The garden…I loved everything about it. One of my favorite things being how the author left hints to peak interest but I didn’t feel like they took ages before explaining what those hints and how they unfolded. This was a huge plus for me since I tend to need instant gratification. The main mystery of the story wasn’t unraveled right away but with the smaller explanations given sooner, my curiosity was sufficiently satiated.

I liked all the characters. With the multiple POVs, I did feel like we didn’t see all characters grow/develop as much as we could have but I was not disappointed in any way with what we got.

I felt like the magic system was very confusing and I didn’t really connect with the characters.

2/5 stars

Thank your NetGalley and Forever for the digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you to the publisher for my review copy. All opinions are my own.

Okay. {shakes head up and down}. This one was okay. Meh if you will. Now, to be fair. I picked this one up purely thinking it would give me Sarah Addison Allen vibes....and it kinda did. I'm going to talk from both sides over here. What I liked and what didn't work for me.

I loved the mystery aspect. You truly didn't know what was going on.
Really enjoyed the premise. Very different and honestly it worked.
The second chance romance was a go for me...always a good idea.

What made it meh...

I did not connect with the characters. I was very much an observer. It was very surface level for me and I needed more.

At first. There were a lot of characters/families to keep up with. If there is a family tree in the beginning and it is only one book. Red flag.

Trying to figure out who belonged to who and what that person could do magic wise was confusing. I'm still not a 100% with one of the characters....true story.

Overall. I didn't hate it. I'm not sorry I read it. It will however, be forgettable. It was okay.

I picked this on a whim based on the cover and I was shocked how much I loved it. This is what I wanted from the practical magic series. I highly recommend.

I am clearly in the minority on this one! This should’ve been a perfect fit for me but it wasn’t.I typically love books with magic but I struggled to understand the magic, the characters and how everyone in Yarrow was connected to each other. Had to stop and start several times to get engaged in the story. Took a big chunk of time to set up the story and the mystery was only introduced after quite a bit of time. Very slow mystery that was not compelling. Interesting concept: would you be willing to give up memories of your worst life experiences or heartache? Obviously though this comes with a cost. Would it be worth it? Plenty of questions to make the reader think.

Thank your NetGalley and Forever for the digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I was given an Arc copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

The feel of this very much reminded me of Practical Magic and I loved it! This book had me sucked in from the beginning and I was guessing the entire time!

I loved the magic in this world because it was so different from other books you read!

Definitely 5 star read and will be pre ordering a physical copy for my shelf!

Thank you to NetGalley for an arc in exchange for my honest review- all thoughts and opinions are my own.



This was good- different than what I expected, I think the blurb didn’t do the book justice and vice versa.

At the start of In the Shadow Garden, you’re going to be referring back to the family trees, as you meet members of multiple generations of Yarrow’s three founding families - the Haywoods with the shadow garden, the Bonners with the bourbon distillery, and the Bakers who own the market. Happily, Liz Parker gives every character a distinct voice and POV. So once you’ve met the cast, you won’t have any trouble keeping characters straight.

Family is the heart of this book - both the warmth and love and the darker, colder sides. And how secrets can strangle. I love the relationships Addison has with the other Haywoods - even when they disagree, they’re still a family. Contrast that with the coldness of the Bonners, their manipulations and secrets.

Yarrow is a charming small town, with a tea shop, market, distillery, and of course, festivals and farmers markets. Incredibly idyllic, especially when you add in the gorgeous produce from the shadow garden.

Liz Parker’s descriptions, especially of produce, tea, and bourbon, are incredibly rich and lush. You can nearly smell and taste what she describes.

You get:

Witchy family
Multiple POV
Small town
Second chance romance
Generational secrets and feuds
Garden porn
Tea shop and tea leaf reading
Bourbon
Close family
LGBTQIA+ rep
Diverse

This is magical family perfection - generational feuds, enchanting love stories, gorgeous shadow garden, magical bourbon, tea leaves revealing the future long hidden, cloaked by lies and magic. Liz Parker’s created a town of people that it’s incredibly easy to fall in love with. Yarrow sounds utterly enchanting. For fans of Erin Sterling and Lana Harper.

I liked this one, it reminded me of Sarah Addison Allen, who I adore. But I felt that this had a few too many characters to keep track off. Still it had lovely bits of magical realism and family.

Thanks NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!

You have to suspend some belief but I didn't feel it took away from the book.

This was a good story mixed with name themes- sorrow, forgiveness, mystery, second chances, magical realism and more. There is a whole story missing from people's memories

We have 2 families- The Haywood's whose magic runs through the women. They can take your sorrow and bury it in their shadow garden to take away pain. The Bonner's whose bourbon can make you forget memories of the past.

As a Bonner (Kaden)comes back into town and people only remember his name and a Haywood (Irene) falls seemingly quick for him, the families are at war once again. But there is something happening to the shadow garden and this summer, the families need to find a way to find one again the memories of that lost summers to put things back to rights.

Make sure to read the author's note and her basis behind the story. It says things more beautifully than i ever could.

A charming and intriguing magical realism story set in the South. Two families drive the plot -- the Haywoods, who take people's pain/sorrow and plant it in their garden, giving rise to unique items, and the Bonners, who brew a bourbon that can take away memories. There is a mystery involving a summer 20 years ago that no one can remember, and what happened back then. An interesting setting and premise, loved this.