The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart

An enchanting and captivating novel about how our untold stories haunt us -- and the stories we tell ourselves in order to survive.
After her family suffers a tragedy, nine-year-old Alice Hart is forced to leave her idyllic seaside home. She is taken in by her grandmother, June, a flower farmer who raises Alice on the language of Australian native flowers, a way to say the things that are too hard to speak.
Under the watchful eye of June and the women who run the farm, Alice settles, but grows up increasingly frustrated by how little she knows of her family's story. In her early twenties, Alice's life is thrown into upheaval again when she suffers devastating betrayal and loss. Desperate to outrun grief, Alice flees to the dramatically beautiful central Australian desert. In this otherworldly landscape Alice thinks she has found solace, until she meets a charismatic and ultimately dangerous man.
Spanning two decades, set between sugar cane fields by the sea, a native Australian flower farm, and a celestial crater in the central desert, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart follows Alice's unforgettable journey, as she learns that the most powerful story she will ever possess is her own.
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Community Reviews
There were points where I felt like crying. Points where I was getting so frustrated and upset with the characters. Which then makes you think of all the things theyâve lived through and the reasons they behave the way they do.
This story does have some domestic violence themes and scenes as well as sexual assault. So please be aware of this when going into this story.
I absolutely loved it. It charts the life of Alice hart from newborn to late 20s throughout the varied, harsh and beautiful land of Australia. It had three major phases and in each of them Alice is surrounded by interesting people and develops in a different way.
The language of flowers was absolutely beautiful - all the things that were hard for the characters to say was expressed through flowers. But I also think Alice is the turning point for that - she learned where some of her ancestors didn’t to stand up for herself, take responsibility for her life and communicate better.
Highly highly recommend this book particularly for Australians who will appreciate the landscape and the Aboriginal culture aspects.
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