Audio Book Review: The Lost Flower Children by Janet Taylor Lisle

This is a short, sweet story dealing with loss.
The Lost Flower Children
by Janet Taylor Lisle (Author),
Caitlin Davies (Narrator)

• Audible Audio Edition
• Listening Length: 2 hours and 23 minutes
• Program Type: Audiobook
• Version: Unabridged
• Publisher: AudioGO
• Audible.com Release Date: November 1, 2012

Genre: Fantasy, Middle Reader
My Rating: 4.5 of 5.0

Motherless Olivia and Nellie go to live with their elderly Great-Aunt Minty, who knows little about children, but a lot about her overgrown garden. Then one day, Olivia finds an old teacup in a flowerbed--and, later, an old story about eight children transformed into flowers. Only the person who finds their teacups can bring them back. Now the two sisters know what they must do.

Review:
Nine year old Olivia and five year old Nellie are struggling with the death of their mother.  Olivia feels lonely and misses her while Nellie creates a set of strange rules to cope with her loss. When their father has to find a new job, they are sent to live with their elderly Great-Aunt Minty. Aunt Minty lives in a cottage with a lovely but overgrown garden. Aunt Minty must learn volatile Nellie’s rules if she wants to avoid rants and tantrums.

Olivia takes advantage of the situation by reading from the large library of books she finds in the house. Among the books she finds a story about lost children who disappeared during a tea party in the garden. The story says that some evil garden sprites put a curse on the children turning them into flowers. They missed the youngest child who had slipped into the house so they made her mute so she couldn’t tell what she had seen. The curse could only be broken when all of the teacups and teapot were found and reassembled.

Having found one tea cup the girls set out to dig through the garden. Aunt Minty thinks it is harmless and they are all a bit surprised as they begin to find one cup after another as they clean out weeds and clean up the garden. The relationship between the girls and Aunt Minty grows gently. The ending brings surprises, changes and leaves a little mystery.  I think middle readers would enjoy this bit of sweet fancy and its gentle message.

Audio Notes: Caitlin Davies does a beautiful job of keeping the tone light and mysterious. She captures the protectiveness of Olivia, the whiny pitch of Nellie and the gentle soothings of Aunt Minty. Well done!

I received this for review from AudioGO through AudioBook Jukebox.