Title: The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern
Author: Lynda Cohen Loigman
Publisher: St. Martins Press
Genre: Historical Fiction w/magical realism vibes
Thank you so much @lloigman for joining @bookfriendsbookclub last night to share more about yourself, books, writing and ultimately let us dig a little deeper on your 4th novel, The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern.
Cozy.
Magical.
Second Chances.
Strong Tenacious FMC.
“It’s never too late for new beginnings.”
The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern is told in a dual timeline storyline. It’s one of my favorite styles of story telling and I often find myself gravitating to one or the other. But, in this story I was equally drawn to a Pharmacy in 1920s Brooklyn and a 1980s retirement community in Florida.
1920s Brooklyn - We meet young Augusta who is full of grief after losing her mother. She idolizes her Dad who is the owner and pharmacist of the neighborhood pharmacy. Despite living in an era where women are only supposed to be wives and mothers, Augusta has goals and plans to go to pharmacy college and be a pharmacist too. She also becomes equally fasciated by her great-aunt Esther who comes to live with them and brings along her mortar, pestle, and apothecary trunk filled with herbs, tinctures and powders she uses as a healer. Esther teaches Augusta many things, but most of all she teaches how to comfort people with something as simple as a bowl of chicken soup.
1980s Florida - Augusta in now eighty and begrudgingly retires from her career as a pharmacist. When she relocates to FL, the very first day she bumps into Irving her father’s old delivery boy and the man who broke her heart all those years ago…
This back and forth timeline is going to have you hooked. The author transitions the timelines perfectly. You won’t want to stop reading; you will be eager to pick it back up when you do.
I loved how atmospheric 1920s Brooklyn felt. I could vividly picture this pharmacy and a soda shop counter. I could picture the neighborhood and neighbors. I was so surprised to know in that in the era of prohibition pharmacy’s prescribed whisky. If I’m blessed to live into my eighties and can’t live on my own anymore, I want a community like Augusta had. My aging goal is to not lose my sass. I love books like this with sassy octogenarian characters.
This book married themes of grief, how women and seniors are seen, and second chances; it will remind you that it’s never too late to find love. If you want to be something, you have to do it. So write that book, do your art, have that career; whatever you want. We only have one wild and precious life!
If you missed our zoom you can watch it on YouTube here
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