A quirky and heart-warming debut about family, life, and long-buried
secrets.
Loosely based on true events, this is a multi-generational tale about
relationships and family. Short, punchy chapters provide a fragmented
framework to the stories, which gradually begin to come together into a
whole. In 1920 Irini Gaspari, a young Greek woman, leaves behind all
that she holds dear ñ her family, and particularly her friend Martha ñ
and emigrates to America, bound for an arranged marriage to a man she
has never met. After tragedy strikes and her closely-knit family
gradually seems to crumble to pieces, little Marieta finds her own path
into womanhood in the changing world of the 1950s and 1960s. She faces
struggles and joys, and tends to her garden where each plant and tree
bears a memory of someone, while a dianthus holds a bitter secret.
Jumping forward to 2010, in Akron, Ohio two brothers, Herman and
Richard, in spite of their very different personalities, seem to have in
common an awkward relationship with love. In their own, de-romanticised
ways, they are looking for 'the one.' They navigate romance, and take
care of an ageing mother riddled with dementia and an obsession for her
garden. The lives of these characters are interwoven through Frieda
Kahlo: an introspective and enigmatic calico cat who drifts between
reality and the spiritual world, connecting the generations of
characters. A mysterious character reveals his true identity at the end
of the novel, and sets the scene for a happy ending.
"All the more impressive when considering that The Various Stages of a
Garden Well-Kept is author R. R. Davis' debut as a novelist, this
original and exceptionally well written collection of memorable
characters and an inherently interesting and narrative driven story of
the emigrant in America is especially and unreservedly
recommended."--Midwest Book Review
Fiction.
