Staff Reviews

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton is set in England and Australia.  In 1913 a ship docked in Australia, everyone disembarked and left, everyone but a tiny little girl who did not know her parents surname or where they could be reached.  Her only possession was a small suitcase with a remarkable book of fairy tales. Hugh, the dock master, took her home, after all he couldn’t leave her sitting outside alone on the dock!  His wife desperately wanted a child, as the days passed and no one claimed the little girl, they named her Nell and she became the first of their children. Over time Nell’s memory of her origins was replaced by the memories of growing up with her Australian family.  She was such a little tyke when she was found by Hugh, that it was expected she would forget. 

When Nell turned 21, Hugh determined to tell her what he knew about her origins.  It changed everything for Nell, she no longer felt tethered to her life, part of a family, now she felt other, adrift and alone.  The distance his disclosure created between Nell and her Australian family broke Hugh’s heart.  When he died, one of her sisters delivered to her the small suitcase.  Memories of a woman, the authoress, started coming back. 

In the 1970’s Nell traveled to England, determined to find out who she really was, but other obligations prevented continuing the pursuit of her origins.  When Nell dies in 2005, her granddaughter Cassandra was shocked to discover what little was known about Nell’s birth family, Nell had kept the knowledge a secret shared only with her father, Hugh. Cassandra and Nell lived together in Brisbane where they ran an antique shop. Without Nell, there was nothing tying Cassandra down, Nell had raised her since she was a little girl.  She determines to retrace Nell’s steps to Blackhurst Manor on the Cornish Coast and unlock he secrets of the past.