Where the Wildflowers Grow by Terah Shelton Harris

Where the Wildflowers Grow by Terah Shelton Harris
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thank you to Sourcebooks Landmark and NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Leigh is the last of the Wildes. She knows this because she watched them all die.

Grief never truly fades and even as the tragedy haunts her, Leigh carries on, because survival is in her blood. So, when the transport bus taking her to prison careens off the road, killing everyone onboard except her, she does what's in her nature. She survives.

While searching for a place to hide, Leigh stumbles upon an unexpected sanctuary: a flower farm in rural Alabama tucked away from the world. What Leigh doesn't expect is the found family there who have built something from the wreckage of their own lives. Especially Jackson, the farm's owner, who sees through Leigh's defenses, offers her small moments of tenderness, encourages her to face her own tragedies. Slowly, Leigh finds peace with the hard pace and soft nature of the farm, taking comfort in the life blooming around her. Maybe she's not beyond redemption, not too broken for something good. And maybe, just maybe, Leigh starts to heal.

But the past isn't so easily buried.

No matter how far she runs, the truth of who she is and the ghosts of the Wildes follow. And when those secrets catch up to her, threatening everything she's come to love, Leigh will have to truly face what she can survive.
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If a book is about found family, I am almost sure to love it. And that is certainly true of this newest offering from Terah Shelton Harris. I was grabbed by this beautful story immediately, as our brave, resilient FMC sets off to heal from generations of trauma and her own personal grief and tragedy. Unfortunately, she has the added wrinkle that she is on the run from the law. As Leigh's story unfolds throughout the book, she is introduced to a whole cast of characters who I could not help but fall in love with, as their stories were richly told, and they became an integral part of Leigh's journey. All of this set against the backdrop of a rural Alabama flower farm makes for a rich and layered piece of fiction that is partly a love story but mostly a story of the survival of the human spirit and what happens when you take a chance on people and let them in.

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