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Book Review of The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern

The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern
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I loved everything about The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern by Lynda Cohen Loigman! It was so unique to have a pharmacist heroine.

This is the âsecond chance romanceâ story of Augusta and Irving in two timelines, as teens in the 1920s and as senior citizens in the 1980's. They fell in love in Brooklyn while Irving worked for Augusta's pharmacist father, but then life circumstances took them in very different directions. They reconnect just before Augusta's 80th birthday when she retires to Florida. (It's clever that the retirement community's name is Rallentando Springs as rallentando is a musical term that means âslowing down.')

The novel is filled with humor and heart, and the character interactions felt genuine. I thoroughly enjoyed both timelines which isn't always the case for dual timeline stories. I appreciated the relationships Augusta has with her aunt Esther and with her niece Jackie. It's interesting that the plot juxtaposes the science of pharmacology and the magical realism of Esther's chicken soup.

This is the first novel I've read by this author and am so looking forward to exploring her backlist.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and the Thoughts From a Page podcast for the egalley of this wonderful novel.