The Poison Diaries

July 26, 2010
Based on a concept by the duchess of Northumberland, Wood (The Mysterious Howling) tells a passionate story of love, betrayal, and loquacious plants in this unique, slightly bizarre tale, first in a planned trilogy. Sheltered 16-year-old Jessamine lives with her domineering apothecary father, Thomas, in an austere cottage near an abandoned castle in late 18th-century England. Frequently left alone while her father journeys to London, Jessamine is thrilled when Weed, a taciturn teenage orphan, shows up. Weed has a vast knowledge of plants, which Jessamine learns comes from his ability to communicate with them. A sweet romance between Weed and Jessamine is threatened by Thomas’s desire for Weed to teach him about the poisonous plants in his garden. The story, slow at first, accelerates when Wood makes it apparent that Jessamine’s father is connected to her grave and sudden illness. The final chapters are a bit disjointed, as the first-person narration jumps between Jessamine, Weed, and the slyly evil Prince Oleander plant. Still, Wood does a marvelous job of creating heart-wrenching decisions for her characters and portraying a doomed romance reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet. Ages 12–up.

November 1, 2010

Gr 7 Up-Readers will be intrigued by both the romance and complex moral questions in this fantasy set in late-18th-century England. Jessamine, 16, lives with her apothecary father, Thomas Luxton, in the remote countryside near Alnwick Castle. As she keeps house and tends to the gardens, there is one place she is forbidden to go: only her father enters the locked apothecary garden where he nurtures poisonous plants collected from all over the world. Their pastoral existence is interrupted by the unexpected arrival of Weed, a straggly teenage orphan who has an inexplicable knowledge of the medicinal uses of plants. As romance blossoms between Jessamine and Weed, she discovers that he is able to communicate with all growing things. Luxton begins to crave Weed's know-how and allows him into the apothecary garden, where the teen is made physically ill by the overwhelmingly evil personalities of the poisonous blooms. What begins that day propels the three characters into a tangled web of passion, betrayal, and the supernatural influence of the Prince of Poison. The novel explores the nature of good and evil and the consequences of choices whatever their intentions. As Luxton's explanation foreshadows, a plant that can kill used in one way can heal used in another. Told mostly in Jessamine's voice, the story has a compelling sense of urgency and mystery even as climactic events become too melodramatic. The book is based on a concept by the current Duchess of Northumberland who created the real Poison Garden at Alnwick Castle.-Cheri Dobbs, Detroit Country Day Middle School, Beverly Hills, MI

Copyright 2010 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 15, 2010

Jessamine, 16, tends house and garden for her stern apothecary father in isolated Northumberland. Thomas Luxton relentlessly catalogs the properties of plants, visits London for days and forbids Jessamine from entering his locked garden of poisonous specimens. Weed, an orphan able to commune with plants, irrevocably alters their lives as he and Jessamine fall in love. Employing a "concept created by the Dutchess of Northumberland" (whose renowned gardens at Alnwick Castle include a poison garden), Wood fashions a narrative whose conventions of gothic romance intertwine with, then utterly succumb to, the brutal forces of human obsession. As Jessamine sickens mysteriously, Weed desperately seeks her cure, entering the poison garden repeatedly, goaded by Jessamine's sinister father. Like the supernatural hecklers of Greek mythology, the denizens of the poison garden—their "Prince," Oleander, paramount—torment Weed into unspeakable acts in love's service. Innocent Jessamine's garden diary is taken up by Weed two-thirds in, permitting the author to dig at the notions of human goodness and love's purity until she exposes their base elements. Absorbing, with room for a sequel. (Historical fantasy. YA)

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