Treat Your Friends Like You Treat Flowers, With Love and Care

If a picture is all that I have

I can picture the times that we won't get back

If I picture it now, it don't seem so bad

Either way, I still wish you were here

Don't say everything's meant to be

'Cause you know it's not what I believe

Can't help but think that it should've been me

Either way, I still wish you were here

Wish You Were Here - Neck Deep

Wait a second,

Why should you care, what they think of you

When you're all alone, by yourself

Do you like you? Do you like you?

You don't have to try so hard

You don't have to give it all away

You just have to get up, get up, get up, get up

You don't have to change a single thing

Try - Colbie Caillat

For the purposes of this review, I will be referring to our author as Viola Shipman, although there is a technicality. A well known memoirist named Wade Rousse uses the name Viola Shipman as a pen name. Rousse uses this pen name as an honor to his grandmother. Rousse uses his grandmother’s name whenever he writes about family stories as tributes to his elders. I did not know this fact when I picked up the book, but finding out after makes it that much sweeter.

To get us started, The Heirloom Garden is a heartwarming story about an elderly woman named Iris Maynard who has had a lot of tragedy affect her life and how she overcame all that was thrown at her with the help of a few friends. This story also features a woman named Abby Peterson and how Abby has had struggles and difficulties thrown at her life and how she needs to be open to failure in order to achieve her dreams of a job and her family. This story focuses on bonding over trauma from the war, that then shows how hope, love and friendship can be gained through a garden of flowers.

This story starts off during the summer in the 1940s with our first protagonist, Iris Maynard. Iris lives in Grand Haven, Michigan with her husband Jonathan and daughter Mary. Iris works on a “Victory Garden” with her fellow military wives on a plot of land behind her house, which doubles as a baseball field. We meet Iris’ best friend Shirley and learn that Iris loves to experiment by mixing flowers and growing her own in her greenhouse. It is a beautiful way to introduce Iris’ lifestyle. We then get introduced to Iris’ daughter Mary, who thinks gardening is dumb and gets into a fight with her mother. They end up making up which brings us towards the end of the prologue. The prologue ends with Iris in the Victory Garden having military men approaching her with a telegram. Within the telegram Iris reads that Jonathan has died in World War II and this devastates Iris.

The story then jumps to our second protagonist, Abby Peterson in the year 2003. Abby is with her relator Pam looking for a house to rent. While Pam is showing Abby the house they are thinking about renting, Abby’s daughter, Lily, sees an American flag up on the porch. This then brings Lily to ask Abby if her dad put the flag there and Pam tells Lily that her dad is a war hero, telling the readers that Abby’s husband was either in the war or he still is. This angers Abby, but with Pam apologizing and Abby trying to keep the scenario as short as possible, Pam starts to describe the house. Pam mentions that the house next door is technically the same style, but nothing alike besides that. The house next door has a ten-foot tall fence and it looks like the house has seen better days. Pam ends up telling Abby that the owner of that house is an old lady who lost her husband in World War II, lost her daughter, then she went crazy and another small detail, that the house she will be renting with her family, the crazy old lady owns as well. As readers we then realize the crazy old lady is Iris. Pam continues on telling Abby the perks of the house, whether it is the view of the lake from the front yard, the house being apart of a set of original houses from 1800s and much more. Pam asks Abby why she chose to move to Grand Haven which leads us into Abby’s storyline. Abby says she has a job offer here and her husband has returned back from the war so she wants to have a fresh start for her whole family. Pam continues to get awkward, so she decides to walk Abby inside the house, and while Abby makes her way to the porch, she glances over to see a curtain swaying slightly in the window next door.

Once in the new house, Abby starts unpacking all her family’s belongings. While Abby is unpacking, her husband Cory, who is asleep on the couch starts screaming. Abby rushes to his side to assure him that he is safe in their new home. Cory then gains his self awareness back and grabs a beer, which in turn Abby asks if he needs it, and Cory rebuttals with a “yeah, i’m sure” and orders Abby to bring him another one. We learn that Cory is obsessed with watching reports on the war. Abby doesn’t think it is good for him, but Cory won’t hear anything about it. Abby continues unpacking items and realizes that her new kitchen reminds her of her grandma’s house. Abby goes outside to view her new yard and the smell of lilacs catches her attention. Her nose leads her to her next door neighbor’s ten-foot tall fence where there is a small hole a woodpecker seems to have made. Abby grabs an old rusty chair and climbs to see through the hole, but unfortunately cannot see much. Abby prays the chair doesn’t break, but she closes her eyes and for a small moment, she is back at her grandmother’s house where she feels like a little girl again, safe, and unaware of life’s horrors. That night she dreams of lilacs.

We stay in 2003 for the next chapter, but now we are in Iris’ perspective. We learn that Iris’ whole life is dedicated to her garden and her flowers. Much like last chapter and the title of this part, lilacs are the main theme. Lilacs, just like Abby, make Iris feel safe like when she was a little girl and they also remind her of her grandmother. We learn that Iris put up her fence because everyone around her were strangers now, but Iris admits the real reason for the fence was because she couldn’t stand the stares and looks people gave her. The looks that are because she lost her family and make her feel as if she was apart of the circus. Iris hated how it felt when people would shy away from her as if “her bad luck just might rub off.” To Iris though, the fence isn’t much of a problem. She can barely see it anymore because she has so many flowers growing to completely engulf it and make it something she loves to look at. Iris goes in depth on her history with her house, and the history with her love of flowers. To her, “it was my family’s flowers that captured my heart.” Iris loved hearing how each flower was passed from “mother to daughter, friend to friend, garden to garden,” and how each flower meant so much to each gardener, saying it was “a tribute to patience, care, time and love.” But what she loved most of all was how she thought it was a tribute to hope. She goes on explaining that you can hope for different things and “everything must hibernate in order to grow anew,” her grandma said. It was a beautiful introduction on Iris’ beliefs and love for flowers and how deep her emotions can go. To end the chapter, very similarly to Abby’s chapter, Iris ends up catching Abby pressing her nose against the fence, trying to smell Iris’ lilacs.

Lily comes into the story by surprising Iris on the other side of the fence. Iris finds Lily breaking off Iris’ flowers and creating a bracelet on her wrist. Lily says hello to Iris and startles her. Iris calls Lily out for stealing her flowers which Lily responds that she thought they were theirs because they were growing on their side of the fence. Being the adorable little girl she is though, she offers them back to Iris and introduces herself. Iris gets a little startled because of her name, but Lily then asks Iris what her name is. Iris decides to introduce herself and Lily says they are both named after flowers. Lily asks Iris about the name of the flower she plucked because her mom didn’t know, which in turn Iris tells her they are called bleeding heart and she explains to Lily why it is such a beautiful flower and tells the story on how they got their name. Lily ends up getting sad over the story, and Iris apologizes, but that is when Lily mentions that her father doesn’t appreciate her mom’s gifts which leads Iris to ask where her parents are. We learn that Abby is still at work and Lily was at camp which her father was supposed to pick her up from. He clearly did not pick her up from camp, so she walked home and is sitting outside alone. While Iris and Lily get emotional about the houses they both are living in, Cory walks outside to ask Lily who she is talking to and Lily reminds him he was supposed to pick her up from camp and his immediate reaction is “don’t tell your mother.” This then gets Lily to ask Iris to promise not to mention anything they talked about today, with a “cross my heart” promise from Iris. Lily leaves Iris to the bleeding heart with which Iris grabs a stem and wraps it around her wrist into a bracelet, just like Lily did and “just like my Mary did, too.” It is a beautiful mention of Iris’ daughter Mary because besides the few flashbacks we have read, there really isn’t any mention of Mary in the present day so we are unsure when or how she died. Later on in the book Shipman tells us that Mary passed away from polio, at quite a young age, which can explain why Iris feels such a soft spot for Lily.

Earlier on we learn that Abby is an engineer, but deeper within the story we learn that Abby works at a nautical paint manufacturer. We also get to learn about Abby and her struggle with work, which also happens to be a similar struggle Iris had to go through when she was younger too. At Abby’s new job, she was given the opportunity to lead a project to spice things up in the paint industry. Abby creates a series of paint colors inspired by flowers, which in turn stirs up different emotions at her work. Certain coworkers, who are too “manly”, say they do not think any customers will want to own a ‘Summer Iris’ or a ‘Pink Peony’ colored boat. Abby, being an amazing boss business woman, responds back with certain facts to overpower those different opinions. Once winning that argument, Abby thinks her project is in the clear, but little does she know her dreams are about to come crashing down. Abby then becomes frustrated at work which does not help her already present frustrations also at home. She gets into an argument with Cory which ends up being a major turning point for Cory’s mental health as well as Abby and Cory’s relationship together and their relationship with Lily. It is a turning point that needed to happen, whether the outcome was good or bad.

Later on we learn that Cory has PTSD from war and this is what is causing all his issues within his family. Cory realizes once he cannot step onto sand to save his daughter from the lake, that his PTSD is taking over his life as well as his family’s lives. Cory and Abby go to a therapist whose specialty is PTSD in war soldiers. Within these therapy sessions, Cory is learning that he needs to trust Abby as well as trusting himself, but not to rush his recovery or progress. Now something else that was quite shocking is Iris ends up helping Cory mentally as well as helping Abby separately. With Iris having the trauma of loosing her husband to the war, Iris helps Cory realize that he is safe, and that he can do things to keep him grounded; one of those things ends up being the task of gardening, which Cory used to do as a hobby in another life. Iris also tries helping Abby understand how Cory feels as well as learning the patience it takes to help Cory adapt to his new life.

In turn to Iris helping Abby’s family, everyone in Abby’s family then helps Iris. With baby steps, Abby, Cory and Lily insert themselves into Iris’ life. They each get her out of her comfort zone of staying inside, and introduce her back to the real world. Abby learns that Iris, just like Abby, was discriminated at her job based off of her sex and they both left those jobs to start their own. Abby wants to start her own engineering business, while Iris started her own greenhouse where she sold her experiments to the occupants of Grand Haven.

Due to the relationship Abby, Cory and Lily have developed with Iris, Cory concocts a secret plan to try and help Iris get closure regarding the death of her husband. Back when Iris found out Jonathan was killed, his body was never discovered and with that Iris never felt any peace or closure. Cory finds a way to obtain news about Jonathan which he ends up presenting to Iris at the end of the book. With that, Cory fears that Iris will be upset, but due to the foundation they have built as a family, Iris surprises Cory.

As a reader, everything that is happening and the jumping back and forth between chapters makes you not want to put the book down. I was torn with which story line I was more intrigued with, but with the continued description of who Iris, Abby, Cory and Lily all are as people is what kept me going.

I rated this book a five out of five stars and it shows as to why. The pure beauty this story holds, whether it is the description of the flowers, the love the characters have for each other, or the character development individually is just gorgeous. Not just talking about the subject of this story, but the way this story was written was brilliant as well. I loved how each specific part was named after a type of flower, and how in that part the flower was mentioned and explained why it was so unique. I also loved how Iris and Abby’s lives were so intertwined in more ways than they could have ever imagined. With specific instances of Iris’ husband being in the war, as well as Abby’s, with their love of gardens and flowers, and hope that the world will be a better place, these two women as well as Cory and Lily, grow close. It is a story that puts into the perspective your family doesn’t need to be blood. Your family are those that love you, support you, and wish you the utmost happiness, no matter what that means to each person.

Wish You Were Here is a song about a friend who was gone too soon. For the purposes of The Heirloom Garden, the lyrics of… if a picture is all that I have, I can picture the times that we won’t get back, if I picture it now, it don’t seem so bad, either way, I still wish you were here is something I want to touch on. This to me speaks to how Iris grew after the loss of her husband and her daughter and after meeting Abby, Cory and Lily. Iris went through a tragic experience from losing her husband and then daughter, both too young, she then had to make her way in the world after the two most important things in her life were taken from her. Iris was depressed, angry, sad, and she let herself become an outcast, someone who was talked about and never checked in on, and a woman who was scared of the world around her. To that point, the lyrics to me speak of Iris after she learned that she needed to get back up and live her life. She of course misses Jonathan and Mary and she wishes they were both still there with her, but she knows that she will be alright. Iris is alive and well and can continue growing flowers for her loved ones that have passed on.

Try by Colbie Caillat is for both of the protagonists in this book. Try is my way of describing Iris as a character and her fight towards the end of the book, and Try is my way of describing Abby and how she fights for what she believes in no matter what. Iris was a woman who was scared of the world after being traumatized by it, and Abby was scared of what traumas were in the world that were within reach. In Abby’s case, she is a hardworking engineer who deserves to be recognized for her ideas and accomplishments and when she is not, when she is discriminated against because of her sex, she stands up for herself. She loves and admires herself for who she is and it is something she will not back down from. For Iris, it is more of waking up every day, realizing that she is worth it and she deserves to be happy no matter what life has thrown at her. Not that Iris isn’t the type of person to also stand up for herself when an injustice occurs, but in this particular instance, I think Iris comes to realize that even though her family has passed on, she gains a new family within Abby, Cory and Lily. In turn, it is something that Iris realizes she deserves. Iris understands that she doesn’t have to try so hard to keep people out, that if she lets the right people in, the world isn’t so scary, but even if it is, she has people who love her and will help tackle the world and its terrors with her.

This book is for someone who can look at something that is delicate and see it’s strength; someone who can wonder about the world and yearn to see its beauty; someone who can suffer in silence and have a bleeding heart for their neighbor; someone who can love something or someone so admirably and have faith that they are on this earth for a reason.