The Peach Keeper - Review

The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen

Rating: 4.5 Stars
Source: Library
Description:  The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Chased the Moon welcomes you to her newest locale: Walls of Water, North Carolina, where the secrets are thicker than the fog from the town's famous waterfalls, and the stuff of superstition is just as real as you want it to be.
It's the dubious distinction of thirty-year-old Willa Jackson to hail from a fine old Southern family of means that met with ruin generations ago.  The Blue Ridge Madam - built by Willa's great-great-grandfather during Walls of Water's heyday, and once the town's grandest home - has stood for years as a lonely monument to misfortune and scandal.  And Willa herself has long strived to build a life beyond the brooding Jackson family shadow.  No easy task in a town shaped by years of tradition and the well-marked boundaries of the halves and the have-nots.
But Willa has lately learned that an old classmate - socialite do-gooder Paxton Osgood - of the very prominent Osgood family, has restored the Blue Ridge Madam to her former glory, with plans to open a top flight inn.  Maybe, at last, the troubled past can be laid to rest while something new and wonderful rises from its ashes.  But what rises instead is a skeleton, found buried beneath the property's lone peach tree, and certain to drag up dire consequences along with it.  (From Goodreads)

Genre: Fiction

Why I Picked This Book:  Sarah Addison Allen has been on my TBR for awhile and I was in a peach kind of mood when I happened to stumble on this one at the library.

My Impression: To be honest I was a little nervous about this going in.  People kept telling me how great she was and that I'd really love this one but I was a little concerned about the whole magical realism thing.  I had read a book by another author that had that and I wasn't a fan of the book.  I didn't know if the problem was the book itself or the magical realism.
But it turned out I had no reason to be nervous.  I absolutely loved this book.  Just the reading experience as a whole was lovely.  I was immediately drawn into the town and the story and could visualize it all so clearly.  I did periodically want to reach into the book and give Willa and Paxton either a shake or a hug depending on what was going on but the book read so quickly I didn't have much time to feel that way.
I couldn't wait to find out what happened and watch everything come together.  The magic that I was so concerned about was barely there.  Enough to make itself felt but much more of a whisper than a shout.  And I was really excited when I realized that the caterer was the same Claire that is in the Garden Spell.  I'll definitely be reading that one soon!

Would I Read More of this Series/Author?: Absolutely!  I'm very much looking forward to spending more time in Sarah Addison Allen's world.

Would I Recommend this Book?:  Yes definitely.  Especially if you're a little concerned about magical realism.

Challenges Met?