A novel that has no cynicism and is just a lovely read is quite rare on my book shelf and this is one of those novels. Rebecca Smith may slip in to some easy stereotypes of absent-minded academics, but this is forgiveable. The novel revolves around the university botanical garden, which sounds a magical place; all the characters spend time there and meet each other there and when it is under threat, the need to save the garden brings them together and changes their lives for the better. She has lots of fun with some minor characters. A generally charming read. ( )

A Bit of Earth by Rebecca Smith is a story of loss: a botany lecturer loses his wife in an accident and is left alone with their small son, to muddle along in a state of abstraction and distress. Young Felix Misselthwaite (nice Secret Garden reference), isolated and unhappy, is saved by his love of the university's neglected botanic garden, where he finds friends animal and human. These two books are about loss and fragmentation, approaching personal disasters from very different angles, but they are also about the redemptive power of the human spirit. A warm and goodhearted book. ( )

Absolutely top-rate. One of the finest books I have read this year. Most of the main characters are damaged: Guy by the death of his wife, mother to Felix; Professor Lovage by the disappearance of her Chilean poet lover and the subsequent miscarriage of their child, back in the seventies; and in the case of the minor characters of Max and Madeleine by being different and not quite fitting in. Nevertheless, things work out for them all in the end, thanks in part to the the university botanic garden that forms the backdrop to the book. The idea of the healing power of involvement with nature may not be particularly original, but there is a gentle and wholesome quality to this novel that is quite rare these days.

-Update January 2012-
I've just re-read this and loved it very bit as much the second time around. ( )