TeaPartyPrincess

I bought this book at Alnwick Castle, where the gated Poison Garden really strikes you as powerful - even more so once you have read this book. Visiting the Poison Garden at Alnwick Gardens can only increase your enjoyment and understanding of this young adult historical tale. This is a fantastic quick read which will leave you impatient for the next instalment.

I liked Jessamine's spunk and nature, Weed's weirdness, and her father's evil plots. The characters are passionate to a flaw: Jessamine in her growing love for Weed and her need to impress her father; Jessamine's father in his obsession in knowing everything about plants, particularly those in his poison garden; and Weed with his love for Jessamine and his distrust of the poison garden. Oleander is a sly, poisonous character, which fits absolutely perfectly as that's what he is - poison.

In the darkness I let myself melt, so he has no choice but to catch me and lift me, cradling my body against his. His mouth finds mine. After the first kiss I arch so his lips brush the tender skin of my throat instead.

I did get exasperated at some points, but I think that as a reader you were meant to - it added to the characters and plot.

This book is filled with passion and energy and a hint of the supernatural. The romance is subtle and builds slowly, the crucible in this intense story.

This book appeals to my love of all things local and tea. Especially tea. Jessamine makes her own teas a tissanes, and I smiled as I recognised ingredients of my own mixtures. I have a pot of lavender by the front door and some lemon balm on the kitchen windowsill - which, by the way, is excellent for your skin and smells divine, I pop it in salads all the time.

I take my metal canister of tea off the shelf. It is my own mixture of dried lavender blossoms and lemon balm, harvested from my garden and hung in the storeroom to dry. Weed helped me hang these stalks, I think. His hands touched these tender leaves, just as they touch me.

And isn't that cover just gorgeous?

Drink tea with this book - nettle would do well.