The Enchanted Greenhouse (The Spellshop, Bk. 2)
Format
Hardcover $10.99List price: $29.99 List Price This is the manufacturer's recommended retail price. Please note older versions of books may not reflect the most current list price due to price adjustments made on newer printings. We strive to keep the website's list price updated to match the current MSRP, based on information from publishers.
About
New York Times bestselling author Sarah Beth Durst invites you to her new standalone novel nestled on a far-away island brimming with singing flowers, honey cakes, and honeyed love. The hardcover edition features beautiful sprayed edges.
Terlu Perna broke the law because she was lonely. She cast a spell and created a magically sentient spider plant. As punishment, she was turned into a wooden statue and tucked away into an alcove in the North Reading Room of the Great Library of Alyssium.
This should have been the end of her story . . . Yet one day, Terlu wakes in the cold of winter on a nearly-deserted island full of hundreds of magical greenhouses. She’s starving and freezing, and the only other human on the island is a grumpy gardener. To her surprise, he offers Terlu a place to sleep, clean clothes, and freshly baked honey cakes—at least until she’s ready to sail home.
But Terlu can’t return home and doesn’t want to—the greenhouses are a dream come true, each more wondrous than the next. When she learns that the magic that sustains them is failing—causing the death of everything within them—Terlu knows she must help. Even if that means breaking the law again.
This time, though, she isn’t alone. Assisted by the gardener and a sentient rose, Terlu must unravel the secrets of a long-dead sorcerer if she wants to save the island—and have a fresh chance at happiness and love.
Funny, kind, and forgiving, The Enchanted Greenhouse is a story about giving second chances—to others and to yourself.
Topics and Key Themes
Narrative Tropes
- Grumpy/Sunshine
- Forced Proximity
- Slow Burn
- Second Chance Romance
- Opposites Attract
Key Themes
- Loneliness rewritten by belonging — a woman frozen in stone learns a remote island can become home.
- Failing magic, urgent stakes — dying greenhouses force a reluctant rule-breaker back into danger.
- Forgiveness as survival — giving second chances to yourself matters as much as giving them to others.
- Warmth found in rough edges — a gruff gardener's honey cakes soften a world that punished too harshly.
- Sentient nature as witness — singing flowers and a talking rose hold the secrets a dead sorcerer buried.
Who is this book for?
Spice Level: 2 out of 5 2 / 5: Mild
A gentle simmer — a few warm moments with minimal detail; the love story leads.
About the Author
Sarah Beth Durst is the author of over twenty-five fantasy books for adults, teens, and kids, including The Queens of Renthia series, Drink Slay Love, and Spark. She has won an American Library Association Alex Award and a Mythopoeic Fantasy Award and has been a finalist for the Andre Norton Nebula Award three times. She lives in Stony Brook, New York, with her husband, her children, and her ill-mannered cat.