the Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

Spanning 100 years, a complicated mystery is revealed. This is another gothic style mystery. It includes three fairy tales, and references to The Secret Garden, and children's stories by Enid Blyth. I couldn't put it down in the two days it took me to read it. Some of it I read through too fast, because I wanted to know what happens! It might require a second read in a few months. I got my copy from the library, but will look for a personal copy to keep in my permanent library now.

Also by this author: The House at Riverton

Eight-Nine-Ten "The Thirteenth Tale

"The Thirteenth Tale"

By Diane Setterfield

I just read this book for the second time. I think the first time was over a year ago, maybe two. I borrowed the book from the library, because I had seen it in the bookstores, but wasn't ready to pay for a hardcover. Then, I found it in paperback in a used book store for $5.00. It was just as good the second time!

I rarely read mystery novels, but this one was sneaky. I didn't realize it was a mystery until I was totally engaged. Maybe I liked it because there are no detectives.

It begins as a story about a young woman's love of books, and her early life being a bookseller's daughter. She is hired to write a final biography for a famous writer and that is when it turns into a Gothic tale -- complete with a crumbling mansion and a secret garden.

Here is a quote I love from the book:

"People disappear when they die. Their voice, their laughter, the warmth of their breath. Their flesh. Eventually their bones. All living memory of them ceases. This is both dreadful and natural. Yet for some there is an exception to this annihilation. For in the books they write they continue to exist. We can rediscover them. Their humor, their tone of voice, their moods. Through the written word they can anger you or make you happy. They can comfort you. They can perplex you. They can alter you. All this, even though they are dead. Like flies in amber, like corpses frozen in ice, that which according to the laws of nature should pass away is, by the miracle of ink on paper, preserved. It is a kind of magic."

The Thirteenth Tale is the author's first and only book. Naturally she is a former academic and lives in Yorkshire, England.