Review of The Springsweet by Saundra Mitchell

Heartbroken over the tragic death of her fiancĂ©, seventeen-year-old Zora Stewart leaves Baltimore for the frontier town of West Glory, Oklahoma, to help her young widowed aunt keep her homestead going. There she discovers that she possesses the astonishing ability to sense water under the parched earth. When her aunt hires her out as a "springsweet” to advise other settlers where to dig their wells, Zora feels the burden of holding the key to something so essential to survival in this unforgiving land. Even more, she finds herself longing for love the way the prairie thirsts for water. Maybe, in the wildness of the territories, Zora can finally move beyond simply surviving and start living.

~ Add To Your Goodreads Shelf

~Will contain spoilers for The Vespertine, book 1~

My first ever NetGalley eBook was The Vespertine and despite trying to get my head around the bizarre idea of being able to read books for free before the release date, I loved every page of it. In particular, I liked on Zora Stewart, a character whose personality flew off the pages and made me laugh when she couldn't get off of the bed due to her dress! I was sad as I closed the book, believing that I wouldn't read anything new from that world again. And then earlier this year I discovered that The Springsweet was about to be released, with none other than Zora Stewart as the main character!

The Springsweet picks up quite a few months after Thomas died and we meet a much changed Zora - she's chosen to stay in black and avoid everyone for a while, believing that Amelia and Nathaniel have died too. Her mother packs her off to the Wild Wild West to live with her aunt and while she's there she discovers that she has some interesting powers too.

Zora slowly gets back to being herself again and you can really see the old Zora shining through her many layers of grief. She has some pretty funny moments in this too, mostly helped by not one, but two romantic interests, the slightly obsessive Theo and Emerson, who is decidedly rougher around the edges! Who will she pick? I think the 'problem' of two interested boys was fixed really well and I loved the outcome. Emerson did remind me a lot of Nathaniel, I have to admit!

The story throws up the interesting idea of elements - specifically the idea of the different powers we come across in this and The Vespertine being linked to the elements - Fire, Air, Water and Earth is covered and after the ending, I'm dying to find out what would happen if these elements all met each other! Needless to say, Aetherbourne is at the very top of my 2013 wishlist.

5/5

Comments

  1. Awesome review! I'm looking forward to reading this one!

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  2. Ooo this sounds brilliant. Been a while since I've read a western (ish) story line :0).

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  3. I'm glad you liked this book....I read The Vespertine, but have yet to pick up Springsweet. You have definitely made me bump this book up higher on my TBR list. Great review!

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  4. I've been meaning to read the Vespertine for a bit I didn't know this one was out - or close to be. I love the idea of it and how it sounds original.

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