The Orchid House [Kindle Edition]

A beautifully constructed novel which explores the connections between people joined by their passion for plants, past and present. The story moves between the tragedy in artist Roma's past and her healing process in the Cornish garden where she draws orchids for one man and observes the dark charms of another. A great read. Refreshing.

If, like me, you enjoy reading books which examine the human condition, this is a must read for you. The Orchid House, like all Avril Joy's books, cuts deep into the blood and guts of life and explores the issues and struggles that we all experience at some time in our lives. A story of death and rebirth, this beautifully crafted novel revolves around the lives of 4 desperate souls living in a self imposed exile from the world. Set within the confines of a formal Victorian garden, managed, controlled and full of order, these characters exist in chaos, haunted by the death of a loved one, consumed with guilt, pain and loss.

Roma. Her life straddles two worlds, neither quite real. The former a life in paradise, a dream life full of passion and colour shockingly brought to an end by the power of the sea. The present, a life of going through the motions numbness - until the arrival one day of Max.

Will. Weighed down by a guilty secret, he buries himself in his work - tending the garden. The Orchid House is the jewel in his crown, his passion, his life, his obsession - until he meets Roma.

Madeline. Harvests the garden. Immortalising it through the production of tinctures and remedies, she strives to keep it alive, like the memory of her husband lost in WW2 and a child - drowned.

Max. Always on the move, running from place to place but always back to the garden - to Will. Hedonistic, domineering and decietful he harbours many dark secrets, secrets that threaten to destroy him.

The Garden. Formal, demanding, needy, never resting, always changing. Enticing, stunningly beautiful, full of colour and heady aromas holding their secrets in every stem, leaf and flower.

Conflict. The story is intercut with a commentary on the Falklands war. The village experience - the annual deluge of tourists as an invasion. The visitors to the garden are a necessary invasion. The precious orchids are plundered from paradise. Men risk their lives to possess them.

A heady mix of botanical fact and narrative fiction, this is an intelligent well observed novel, full of detail, full of emotion and ultimately full of love.

I enjoyed this book enormously and had no difficulty getting into it.

Roma returns to England after her lover is drowned in a tragic accident in Sri Lanka. She blames herself for his death and is inconsolable. At home in her Cornish village she hides away in Trescombe House with Will. He is the head gardener and orchid keeper for Max, the owner of Trescombe. However, if Roma wants peace and serenity Trescombe House isn't the best place to be.

Trescombe is a beautiful place, full of spectacular flowers and trees, but there is somthing else in the gardens - a malevolent, almost gothic presense. I was reminded of that film The Innocents - an adaptation of The Turn of the Screw = where a young boy is possessed by the devil. Max is a man who enjoys nailing live snakes to trees to amuse the children! There is also the black lake where a little girl drowned in suspicious circumstances.

I like novels that keep me on my toes and this one most certainly did. I had worked out several endings for the book but I was wrong on all counts. The structure of this book is most impressive. I loved the way Avril wove the past and present together and included extracts from the Rev Dodson's gardening diaries.

It was a reading treat. Very difficult to put down. Don't miss it.