Novella
I'd never read a book by Sarah Painter, but it's hard to resist her beautiful covers, so I offered to review this audiobook for Audiobook Boom. I don't know the author or the narrator, so this is an impartial review.
Iris Harper is a herbalist, but she is getting on in years and I felt for her struggle to get downstairs and answer the doorbell when it rang. She has quite a reputation, but I couldn't quite see how she was going to help when a young girl is wrongly accused of theft.
In fact, I thought she was unacceptably rude to Bex when she came asking for help, and Bex was surprisingly long suffering. In the end, the resolution revolved around a considerable coincidence, which always makes me cringe.
It was an enjoyable listen, if a bit twee; well narrated by Tracey Norman. But it was only a novella, so it was hard to get into the story or the characters, before it drew to its conclusion. For this reason I'd feel this book was better suited to those who had already read some of Sarah Painter's novels, as it would elaborate on some of the folk they had already met. For a first time reader it was too short and didn't make me feel I needed to read more.
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