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Great Novels About Gardens & Flowers
By: Angela & Melissa
Updated:
As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, we may earn a referral fee from qualifying purchases.As spring blooms and the weather warms up, many people find themselves venturing out into their gardens to tend the plants and flowers. If you’re looking for the perfect gardening novel, these books will transport you to a world of blooming flowers, fruit, vegetables, and other beautiful landscapes.
The Best Gardens in Historical Fiction
These historical fiction novels not only provide an escape to a different time but also highlight the importance of gardens throughout history. You’ll be transported to different eras and can explore the impact that gardens have had on culture and society in different time periods.
The Secrets of Flowers
Book Summary
After the death of her husband a year ago, Emma feels no closer to moving forward with her life. In need of a distraction, she quits her job and begins working for a local garden center, but this just allows her to be a wallflower hiding among the blooms.
When a colleague invites her to a talk about the Titanic, she suddenly becomes interested in learning more about the stewardess who arranged all the flowers aboard the ship.
As Emma begins researching the lost story of the stewardess, she realizes that flowers may also be the key to unlocking long-buried secrets in her own life as well.
What to Expect in This Book
This flower-centric novel is described as both heartwarming and inspiring, despite grief being one of the themes. Hazel Prior (author of How the Penguins Saved Veronica) says it’s filled with “light, color, and kindness.”
The Sky Beneath Us
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
100% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
In 1927, Violet followed her dream of attending the Edinburgh School of Gardening for Women. When she enrolled, she had no idea it would take her deep into the landscapes of Nepal, so far from her Scottish homeland.
In 2020, Daisy sets out on the trip of a lifetime to track her great-great-aunt Violet’s journals, which chronicle the plant-hunting that took her to the shadows of Mount Everest. When fate and a pandemic leave Daisy stranded, she must rely on the kindness of strangers and the same determination and resilience that Violet needed during her experience.
Behind the Book
Don’t miss the beautiful 15-minute video about the research trip that Fiona Valpy took to Nepal as her research for this novel! She is also donating some of the proceeds of the book to The Little Sherpa Foundation, which helps fund projects in Phortse village and the wider Khumbu area.
The Last Garden in England
Book Summary
In 1907, Venetia Smith was a rising star in the world of garden design. Bankers, industrialists, and solicitors hired her to showcase their wealth through elaborate gardens at their country homes, including Highbury House.
In 1944, the Highbury House cook is desperate to pursue her own dreams. Widow Diana, the mistress of the grand house, is trying to cling to her own life despite her home being used as a convalescent hospital. But now, the war is threatening her home’s treasured gardens.
In the present day, Emma has a career restoring long-neglected gardens. She’s just been given the opportunity to bring the famed Highbury House gardens back to life. But as she dives deeper into the history of the home, she begins uncovering secrets.
All the Pretty Places
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
93% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
Sadie’s family owns a nursery that has supplied the top landscape architects on the East Coast for decades. But in 1893, as the economy plummets into a depression, Sadie’s father begins pressuring her to marry for wealth and stability. Sadie has other ideas for her future. She pursues new business from her father’s wealthiest clients of the Gilded Age in an attempt to save the family nursery.
The more time she spends in the mansions and secluded gardens of the elite, the more she sees the disparity of those struggling with poverty and starvation. She finds a new passion in her desire to bring natural beauty to those who can’t afford private gardens. Along the way, Sadie is also reunited with a former employee and former love, Sam.
Thoughts on This Book
Author Joy Callaway wrote this novel about the life of her great-great-grandmother. While most of our readers enjoy this book, some find that the pace is slower than they prefer.
The Hidden Letters
Book Summary
Landscape architect Isaac is working at a beautiful estate in Cornwall, but he knows he’ll soon be called away to what seems to be the inevitable war. Cordelia is the daughter of the estate, and despite her mother’s concerns that it is unladylike to play in the dirt, she’s drawn to the garden as her escape. Isaac secretly teaches Cordelia how to tend the gardens so the house can still produce food while the men are at war.
Although the connection between Isaac and Cordelia is clear, their love is forbidden because they are from different classes, and Isaac is an estate employee. However, when he’s called off to fight, he doesn’t forget her and begins sending letters. When the letters stop, Cordelia is determined to find out what happened.
About the Book’s Format
This book blends a traditional narrative style with an epistolary format, and readers especially enjoy the sections written as letters.
The Heirloom Garden
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
100% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
After losing her husband in WWII and her daughter to illness, Iris walled herself off from the world. She’s spent many decades hiding behind the tall fence around her home. In place of human connection, Iris has surrounded herself with a family of flowers. She propagates her daylilies and roses and tends a garden that keeps the memories of those she loved alive.
In the early 2000s, Abby is a young mother whose husband has recently returned from military service in Iraq. When Abby’s family rents a cottage along Lake Michigan, next door to Iris’ property, the older woman can’t help but view the young family as a window to the life she once had.
As Iris and Abby are drawn together by their shared love of flowers, the friendship that blossoms between them is a testament to the healing power of both gardening and human connection.
What to Expect in This Book
This book is an interesting look at PTSD for soldiers returning from war, and its effect on the soldier’s family. The comparisons between the 1940s & 2000s add depth to this theme.
Readers particularly enjoy the audio version of this heartwarming book because of the two different narrators who read for Iris and Abby. Keep the tissues nearby as you read because you’re sure to shed a few cathartic tears during the ultimately uplifting tale.
Book Summary
Twenty-one-year-old Emily’s parents have been keeping her close to home ever since her brother, Freddie, was killed in the war. While her parents just want to keep her safe, Emily is longing to find a purpose and a way to honor her brother. When she meets a young Australian pilot who is recuperating at a hospital near her home, she falls in love and accepts his proposal.
When he is sent back to the front lines, Emily volunteers as a “land girl” and is assigned to tend to the grounds of a neglected Devonshire estate. It is here that she discovers the journals of a medicine woman who dedicated her life to her herbal garden. Soon, Emily learns that her fiancé has died in the war and that she is with child. Inspired by the journals, Emily learns about the healing power of herbs, but they will also bring her to the brink of disaster.
Book Summary
In 1822, Edinburgh was focused on interrelated events. First, the old Botanical Garden moved to a new home on the slopes below Inverleith House. It’s quite a spectacle, with full-grown trees being transported on horse-drawn carts. The opening of the new Royal Botanic Garden coincides with the rumored upcoming visit of King George IV. Additionally, the Agave Americana plant looks set to flower—an event that only occurs once every several decades.
Amid the excitement, an unlikely friendship forms. Newly widowed Elizabeth arrives from London to live with her late husband’s aunt, Clementina. Her new grand home borders the new Botanic Garden, and Elizabeth volunteers as an artist to document the impending bloom of the Agave Americana. In the garden, Elizabeth meets Belle, who has a passion for botany and the lucrative, dark art of perfume creation. But Belle isn’t telling the truth about her true identity.
Supplemental Reading Recommendation
After reading The Fair Botanist, we recommend reading this article that highlights more history about the Royal Botanical Garden in Edinburgh, including photos of the large trees being transported in 1822. The article does include spoilers not included in our description.
Contemporary Fiction About Gardens & Gardeners
Contemporary novels offer a fresh perspective on the joys of gardening. From heartwarming tales of community gardens to suburban backyards, we love all the different ways authors have incorporated the magic of gardening into their works.
Where the Wildflowers Grow
Book Summary
Leigh is the last person in her family line, and she knows this because she witnessed the death of everyone else. And when the transport bus to prison that she’s on crashes, she again witnesses the death of everyone but herself. The only option she sees is to do what she’s always done. She must find a way to survive.
As she searches for a safe place to hide, Leigh finds a flower farm, tucked away from the rest of the world. The owners have built it from the wreckage of their own lives, creating a peaceful found family. As she begins to heal and find redemption on the farm, she’s still at risk of her past catching up to her.
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
100% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
Long before spring meant placing orders for seeds through gardening catalogs, the Dakhótas relied on their strong seed-saving traditions for survival. While this book will teach you about that seed-saving heritage, it also covers so much more.
Rosalie Iron Wing grew up learning about plants and her ancestry as a Dakhóta from her father. However, when he goes missing, she is sent to live with a foster family. Decades later, Rosalie is now both a mother and the widow of a farmer. She still takes solace in their land, although it has been threatened by both nature and man.
When Rosalie returns to her birthplace to learn more about her family history, she learns about the trauma of boarding schools, the war between the Dakhótas and the government, and the cache of seeds that survived through generations.
About the Author
Diane Wilson is a Dakota writer and is an enrolled member of the Rosebud Reservation. She uses personal experience to illustrate a broader social and historical context. A longtime advocate for Indigenous food sovereignty, she has led Dream of Wild Health and the Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance. Based in Minnesota, Wilson’s work braids family history, land, and seeds with contemporary Native life today.
Book Summary
Rose has been widowed for two years, and now that she’s retired from her nursing job, she’s trying to figure out how to fill her days. She finds herself drawn to the garden, which had been her husband’s pride and joy. As she tends to the garden, she is comforted by happy memories of her life.
Soon, the restored garden draws the attention of others. Rose’s childhood friend, Daisy, her former colleague, Sally, and her neighbor, Flora, all begin sharing their gardening knowledge and memories. Together, they create a space for the community where old memories can be cherished as new memories are formed.
Reader Thoughts on This Book
This novel is an uplifting story of transformation, both of the physical garden and the hearts and lives of each character as they learn to stand up for themselves. One of our readers rated it 10 out of 10 and said, “Made me think of what memories I have that are triggered by plants or smells and what I would plant in a memory garden.”
Scent of a Garden
Book Summary
Poppy’s parents are Napa Valley hoteliers, but she left home to become a perfumer in Paris. However, when her heightened sense of smell disappears, her career is in danger, and she retreats home to California. She hopes that tending to her grandmother’s aromatic garden will restore her gift.
However, when she arrives, the garden has been uprooted and destroyed. This is a visceral reminder of how her ties to home have been weakened while she was away. Now, to heal, she must juggle family drama, old friendships, and a former love.
Garden of Her Heart
Book Summary
After a brutal attack left her with PTSD, Holly’s job put her on a mandatory “gardening leave” from her job. She decides to spend three weeks at the Pinewoods Retreat, which is not far from her home, so she can leave if it doesn’t work out.
When she arrives, she finds a group of new friends who are also in need of healing. The retreat’s neglected garden also needs care. Holly finds hope along the way as she works to restore the unmaintained garden.
What to Expect in This Book
While this is ultimately an uplifting novel about healing, it includes descriptions of Holly’s PTSD and panic attacks. Reviews describe it as a gentle, warm, and comforting read.
Don’t miss the author’s note explaining how this novel came to be and how it relates to her life.
The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
97% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
The Akha people live in a remote mountain village in China, where, for generations, their lives have revolved around farming tea. Li-yan is one of the few educated girls in the village, and everything begins to change for her when a stranger arrives at the village gate driving a jeep—the first automobile any of them have ever seen. Little by little, Li-yan begins to reject the customs of her village.
When Li-yan becomes pregnant out of wedlock, local tradition calls for her to give her child over to be killed. Instead, she flees to a nearby city, where she leaves her baby at an orphanage. She then remains in the city and puts her experience and education to use by pursuing a career in the tea business outside of the fields.
Li-yan’s daughter is adopted by loving American parents and is raised in a life of privilege in California. As she grows, she continues to wonder about her origins, and back in China, the mother she never knew longs for her as well. The two remain connected across the continents by their family heritage of tea.
Reader Thoughts on This Book
Many readers have assumed that Lisa See would write a sequel to this modern read that feels like historical fiction, but the author has stated in numerous interviews that no sequel is planned. Nonetheless, reviews consider this among the best fiction set in China, and it is consistently highly rated by Book Girls’ Guide readers.
The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
90% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
At the beginning of this novel, the main character, Alice, is only 9 years old and is sent away from her seaside home to live with her estranged grandmother, June, on a flower farm. Over the years, she learns both the language of flowers and about all the women her grandmother has taken in over the years to help them heal from abusive situations.
However, Alice eventually realizes that she has her own unhealed wounds and flees the flower farm. She ends up in the remote, beautiful central desert of Australia. She thinks she has found peace until her new love, Dylan, turns out to be very different from what she expected.
An Award & Adaptation
In May 2019, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart won the Australian Book Industry Award for General Fiction Book of the Year. The book is now a series on Amazon Prime and stars Sigourney Weaver as June.
The Garden of Small Beginnings
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
97% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
Young widow Lili is three years past the car accident that unexpectedly made her a single mom of two young children.
She works as an illustrator and has been selected to create the illustrations for a prestigious vegetable guide. But that means she’s also been assigned to attend a 6-week vegetable gardening class to gain real-world veggie experience. Despite convincing her kids and sister to join her in the class, she’s still not overjoyed with this job requirement. However, one patient instructor and a cast of quirky classmates later, she’ll realize the class isn’t so bad.
While there is a minor romance thread, this is not a romance novel. Instead, it’s both funny and emotional, with themes of sisterhood, family, and healing.
About the Author
If you enjoyed this author’s novel, The Bookish Life of Nina Hill, we think you’ll enjoy The Garden of Small Beginnings.
The Language of Flowers
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
92% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
Abandoned at birth by her mother, Victoria Jones spent her childhood in no fewer than 32 foster homes. At age 9, Victoria wanted nothing more than to be adopted by a woman named Elizabeth, but something went terribly wrong. Nine years later, having aged out of the foster care system at age 18, Victoria finds herself homeless on the streets of San Francisco.
All those years before, Elizabeth instilled a love of flowers and their meanings in Victoria. While Victoria is unable to get close to anyone, she finds that she can communicate through flowers, and she gets a job working for a florist named Renata. When Victoria meets a flower farmer named Grant, her past and present begin to collide. She is forced to confront some painful secrets for a second chance at happiness.
Consider a Paper Copy
This novel is beautifully written and hard to put down! The printed book also includes the author’s flower dictionary, modeled on Victorian-era style.
Book Summary
When Sadie doesn’t get the promotion she both needs and expects, she immediately adds three things to her to-do list – a drink, a one-night stand, and a new place to live. Unfortunately, she tackles these tasks in the wrong order. The drinks turn into Sadie mixing up a dating app and a roommate app. Whoops!
Jack has been dealing with the unexpected death of his parents by escaping into movies and video games alone. After hearing her story, he offers Sadie the spare bedroom in his gorgeous Brooklyn brownstone at an excellent price.
The cheap rent lets her grow her former side business as a florist into a full-time gig. But how long can these polar opposites happily coexist in one house?
About the Book
This is a lighter pick for fans of the rom-com genre, but it still addresses some deeper issues.
Digging In
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
95% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
Paige was widowed two years ago and still isn’t quite back to “normal.” Now, her trusted boss of 22 years is also gone, and his son has taken over. He’s radically changing everything at the advertising firm, including an announcement that he’s getting rid of 2 employees at the end of the summer.
Paige is trying to hold on to her job and sanity for her teenage son’s sake, but her formerly perfect house and yard are both a mess.
As she tries to escape her new work problems on her back porch over a glass of wine, her nosy neighbor lectures her about the dandelions in her yard. In frustration, she pours another glass of wine and begins yanking out the dandelions one by one…and it feels GOOD. Before long, she was looking for a shovel for more yard therapy.
Paige creates a bigger and bigger hole in her yard, much to the chagrin of her fancy suburban neighbors. But it’s helping her cope with the ongoing craziness at work and her lingering grief. Despite her inexperience in gardening and pushy neighbors, she finally begins to feel fully alive again.
About the Author
The author wrote this novel as she was grieving the sudden death of her husband, and we hope the fresh start and healing she wrote for her character were equally healing in her own life.
Rules For Visiting
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
90% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
As a botanist, forty-year-old May prefers spending time with plants over people. She’s a gardener for a local university and likes to observe the lives of others while minimizing her interactions with them. However, in her younger years, she had a group of four close friends.
While it’s not feasible to get the group back together in one place, May sets out to reconnect with them one by one during an unexpected hiatus from work. Part tale of self-discovery and part story of female friendship, this book also explores themes of life’s offline simplicities vs. images of perfection online.
Inspiration for This Book
Fans of The Odyssey might notice how this book parallels the Greek epic. Except in this modern re-interpretation, Penelope is the one traveling instead of Ulysses. You may also enjoy the references to classic literature and gardening, though you can still understand and enjoy the book without a passion for either.
Magical Realism Novels Set in Gardens
Book Summary
Lucy has a special gift in life. She can sense which scent will unlock long-forgotten memories for others, which are often keys to their future. She has a new job as the gardener at a somber, colorless assisted-living home. While her day job brightens the gardens for the residents, the scented flowers she grows awaken the community.
However, as long-buried secrets come to light, one threatens to destroy the close-knit community. Is it better to leave some things in the past?
Garden Spells
Book Summary
Each Waverly family member has a unique gift, and these peculiar gifts have turned them into outsiders in their North Carolina town. Even their garden and apple tree are special, with prophetic fruit and edible flowers that inspire new powers.
Claire Waverly is a caterer who uses mystical plants like snapdragons, pansies, and nasturtiums from the Waverly garden in her cooking to help her customers. Her elderly cousin Evanelle is also known for distributing clever gifts.
Claire and Evanelle are the last of the Waverlys tending the gardens, but Claire has a rebellious sister, Sydney, who fled town years earlier. When Sydney unexpectedly returns with a young daughter, Claire’s peaceful life is turned upside down.
The Twilight Garden
Book Summary
In London, between the houses of No. 77 and No. 79 on Eastbourne Road, there’s a neglected community space called the “Twilight Garden”. In the 1970s, it was a sanctuary for the neighbors who needed it most, but now the garden’s gate is locked closed.
But it only takes one person’s idea to inspire change. Can the Twilight Garden be resurrected, or will a new neighbor put a stop to the healing garden that the others hope to restore?
What to Expect in This Book
This novel is a slower, but beautifully written, slice-of-life read by the author of The Reading List. While the garden is the heart of the story, the diverse characters also encounter several societal issues, including racism, xenophobia, and a character’s insecurity as a gay man of Indian descent.
This book follows two timelines and the families that live on either side of the Twilight Garden in both the 1970s-80s & 2019-2020.
Mystery Books About Gardens
A Muddied Murder
Book Summary
Megan worked as a lawyer in Chicago before returning home to care for her grandmother and the family’s organic farm. She hopes to find a slower-paced, peaceful life in the scenic town.
Instead, her goat disappears, the town denies her cafe permits, and the farm quickly depletes her savings account. Just as she thinks things can’t get any worse, she and the town’s veterinarian find the zoning commission dead in her barn! Suddenly, she’s not just a struggling farmer, she’s a murder suspect.
Book Summary
Grad student Lucy travels to England to solve a literary mystery and finish her dissertation on Elizabeth Blackspear, a famous garden writer. Lucy has a stack of letters between her grandmother and Elizabeth, and the letters seem to include coded references. Things get interesting when an elderly aristocrat with his own secret connection to Elizabeth lets Lucy into his neglected walled garden.
However, the director of Blackspear Gardens refuses to grant Lucy access to the archives. As she continues her research, she uncovers a plan to turn the historic gardens into a theme park, and she must race to save the beautiful land. All the while, she’s trying to determine her grandmother’s connection to Blackspear and trying not to fall in love with a Spanish contractor.
Flowers and Foul Play
Book Summary
Grab your blanket and head to Scotland to meet Fiona in the Magic Garden Mystery series. In the first book, she inherits her godfather’s cottage and walled garden, which may be a bit magical. However, when she arrives in the Scottish Highlands to make a new home for herself, she finds the garden overgrown with weeds…and a dead body!
As a newcomer, she’s quickly questioned but soon realizes that half the town had a motive to take out Alastair Croft, the dead lawyer with more enemies than friends.
Another Gardening Cozy Series to Consider
Check out The Garden Plot, part of the Potting Shed Mystery series for another UK-based gardening cozy mystery. It features a Texas ex-pat living in London as a professional gardener who stumbles on a mysterious artifact, followed by a body, on one of her job sites.
Book Summary
Flora’s family bakery in New York is struggling, even though she’s put her interest in botany aside to help keep the business afloat. In 1940, she had a rare opportunity to save the family. An international ring of flower thieves locates a rare and valuable camellia plant, the Middlebury Pink. They want her to travel to England and pose as a nanny at Livingston Manor, where the last camellia is believed to be hidden. Her quest is more dangerous than she ever imagined.
Over 50 years later, Addison moves to Livingston Manor, which is now owned by her husband’s family. The couple finds an old gardener’s notebook that contains pages hinting at dark acts ingeniously concealed. Will Addison be in danger as she tries to unravel the mystery?
Reader Thoughts on This Book
While this novel receives an overall high rating, some readers are turned off by the insta-love connection of Flora, and others find it a bit formulaic for their taste.
Classics Featuring Gardens
If you’re in the mood for a classic read, many feature gardens prominently as a main setting, since elaborate gardens were popular in England when many now-classics were written.
Here are a few suggestions to get you started:
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
Old Herbaceous by Reginald Arkell
Printable Version of this List
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Join the Spring Mini Reading Challenge
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I recommend Garden Variety by Christy Wilhelmi who is herself a gardener. It’s about a community garden in Los Angeles
Thanks for the recommendation!