It's The Perfect Man movie with magical realism. There's so much hate I feel for some characters (iykyk). The limitations the curse placed on the characters make it them more human so that's my favorite part. There's some confusion in the plot but I like it enough even if it's not my favorite.

I enjoyed this story immensely. Who doesn’t love a good mystery? Especially when there are coffee shops and book stores in a small town involved? I enjoyed the flash backs and the different mother/daughter relationships. I enjoyed the deeper commentary on familial and societal pressures and appreciated how they were woven into the heart of the story. I will read anything Sarah Beth Durst writes forever and always.

“Our lives were shaped by other people’s expectations, other people’s dreams, other people’s choices. We are constrained by love—granted, it was misguided love, a belief that they knew best how our lives should take form. That doesn’t make it better or forgivable, but it’s an explanation, understandable.”

★★★★ 4.5 Stars (If the ending was more satisfying, it would’ve been a 5)

ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ

Elisa is cursed - she cannot stay in one place for more than 10 months, she cannot return to a place she’s been, or she will start to turn into a tree. Forever on the move with her mother, she is unable to take root and make connections anywhere. When her mother passes, she finds herself in Greensborough - and that’s where everything is different.
*That’s all you need to know going into this book - DO NOT read the blurb!! It kind of spoils the book.

We get:
ོ ོ ོ ོ ོ
🐦‍⬛ Magical realism (this is NOT a fantasy book)
🐦‍⬛ Unexplained curses
🐦‍⬛ A local bookstore with a cat
🐦‍⬛ A small town with odd characters
🐦‍⬛ Deep emotions and troubling ideas around the action of choice
🐦‍⬛ Semblance of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

Characters:

𓅆 Elisa: Elisa is such an interesting character, and we get to really know her throughout the story. I wouldn’t say we really see much character development, because the premise of her character is to find out why she is cursed and how to stop it. However, she learns throughout the story why her mother and grandmother acted how they did, and she comes to realize the full capacity around making choices.

𓅆 Owen: Our cutie who runs the local bookstore! Owen is a soft-spoken character who is always willing to drop whatever he is doing and help Elisa. He is probably the most unproblematic man in a book, ever.

Romance: Don’t come into this story expecting a great romance! Or much romance at all for this matter. While it is there in the background, that is not the focus of the story.

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This story focuses on choices we get in our lives, and how what we desire can be pushed onto others and force them to make certain actions. One mother’s decision for her daughter based on what she wanted for her own life but couldn’t have ruined the next two generations because of her selfishness of not realizing that everyone wants different things.

I’ve never quite read a story like this? It does give me hints of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, but at the same time it is a very different premise. It’s a book that has ominous undertones throughout but will keep you thinking.

I’m not going to lie - I didn’t know who was fully behind the curse. We get lots of hints throughout leading us to piece some of it together, but I did not piece it all together until it was explained. I was left a little let down by the ending? It happened very quickly, and I felt like I was still in lack of answers when I closed the book. We never really get a true explanation around the curses, or why the person involved did what they did other than “because I wanted to”. I think the ending to the story had the potential to be very satisfying and poignant, but it was not. However, I still highly encourage this read!

*Thank you to NetGalley and publisher for a copy of this arc.

With the success of The Spellshop, I’m surprised that Sarah Beth Durst’s THE WARBLER hasn’t received more attention. But this surreal story full of quirky small-town characters was a fun read!

The hook is that Elisa must keep moving from place to place or she will turn into a tree and stay rooted. Her search for answers brings her to Greensborough, a town that appears to have a curse of its own - no one can ever leave. When Elisa finds herself stuck like everyone else, she becomes desperate to solve the mystery and break both the town’s curse and her own.

I enjoyed the mystery of the curses and the quirky (slightly creepy) town characters. I also really liked how the story illustrated the weight of expectations, the limits they can place on our choices, and the power of dreams.

'My mother is a willow. She stands by a stream that burbles like a toddler’s kisses, and her leaves dip into the water whenever the wind blows, to be nibbled by fish who don’t know any better.'

What an opening paragraph!

Oh this book was stunning, beautiful and so imaginative!

If you like small towns, curses, a bookshop cat and going back in time to meet members of a family then this is the book for you.

I know I'll be thinking about this book for ages!

A beautiful heartfelt story, with mothers and daughters at its core, that will appeal to readers across the board.

Thank you to NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing for an e-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was not what I expected, but I ended up flying through it and needing to know more.

The bottom line is Elisa is cursed and is trying to figure out why and if she can end the curse. But along the way we get to see Elisa, her mother and her grandmother all navigating life around this curse, and how all 3 women’s wishes and dreams affected their decisions.

I honestly don’t know if I loved Elisa or Lori’s story more, but Lori finally, finally getting to be happy with her love and daughter after years and years of struggling and sadness, I just really liked her character arc. Elisa’s arc included solving a mystery, which I always love, and her narration just felt very real and understandable.

Rose’s story was the toughest for me as she was unable to follow her dreams and essentially caged in, but her final decision… it just made me so upset on Lori and Elisa’s behalf.

I will say that I figured out who was the cause of this, if not necessarily the how, pretty quickly, but I still had a fantastic time reading this.

Highly recommend!

I wanted to like this more than I did. I thought it was ok but overall I just couldn't get into it and I'm not sure exactly who the target audience would be.

This was truly so unexpectedly wonderful. I didn’t have amazing expectations for this, I enjoy SBD’s works a lot so I knew it would be good but not this good.
Generational trauma, a curse causing so much pain and loneliness, the constant search for a normalcy. It was all so well done. SBD’s writing has always been great and this one is no exception. The plot was interesting to begin with but the execution was so well done it hurt. Having the different POVs being connected to each other was perfect. It all came together in the end to the point where you understand everyone’s reasonings and you feel for them so much.
I would highly suggest going into this blind so you could be surprised while reading. The synopsis spoils too much!
At first I couldn’t figure out why the title was The Warbler but it was such a nice reveal at the end that I would never spoil the reason why.

Im not sure how I feel about this book. It was ok. Definitely a different vibe from her cozy books. But this one not much my style . The story was good and well developed it just didn’t catch my attention as much.

I enjoyed the premise of this book and thought it was executed well. The idea of a mother and daughter who can't stand in one place or risk turning into trees was an interesting idea. I did enjoy The Spellshop better than this book. I think this book had more realism than magic and at times it felt forced. Overall, I do recommend reading this book is you're a fan of magical realism, though.

I've only read The Spell Shop by this author and was immediately in love with her writing style and now reading this, I have a new favorite author to add to the list. The writing is just exquisite and is packed with so much emotion. Once again I loved how creative she was with the plot and the characters, I loved every minute of it. It might have taken me awhile to finish this book but that was completely on me, not the book itself.

Thank you, NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing, for the opportunity to read this ARC!

Blending magical realism with multigenerational themes, this intriguing novel explores what happens when 3 women in a cursed family strive to overcome societal expectations and live life on their terms. This book was different from the author’s previous cozy fantasy, The Spellshop, and I enjoyed seeing her take on a real-world setting where the magic was more subdued.

The trio of timelines and POVs kept the pace moving, though I found myself more engaged with the storylines set in the past. Something about the present-day narrative felt underbaked in comparison, and I pieced together the puzzle pretty easily.

The writing style was, of course, beautiful! And I appreciated the underlying message of women’s rights and the struggle many have faced to make their own choices, especially when they don’t align with the status quo.

I had been postponing reading this novel for several months for some reason, and when I finally read it, I thought, *Why haven’t I read it earlier?*

*The Warbler* is a story about a young woman, Elisa, who searches for information about her deceased mother and grandmother in order to break a curse. Women in her family had to always be on the move, without ever having a proper home—otherwise, they would turn into a tree. The story of the curse and Elisa’s search unfolds through the perspectives of three female characters, each from a different time period.

*The Warbler* reminded me a lot of *Weyward* by Emilia Hart. However, *The Warbler* moved me deeply. I felt Elisa’s pain—her anguish at not knowing when or how her family was cursed, her lack of a true home, and her missing out on all the important moments in life: from childhood friendships to prom and first love. Elisa was not only lost in this vast world, but she was lost within herself.

The magical side of the story was brilliantly crafted. It blurred the lines between whether the curse was truly real, mere superstition, or perhaps an issue of mental health. To be honest, I was left undecided, as it felt like a combination of all three.

The story’s development surprised me. I didn’t expect the many intricate details about Elisa’s family and the place they were from. Nor did I anticipate the references to Greek mythology and the myriad mentions of prominent books.

I loved *The Warbler* with all my heart and would recommend it to everyone who enjoyed *Weyward* or Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s short story series. Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley, thank you for trusting me with an advanced copy of this novel.

Absolutely loved this story! I feel grateful to NetGalley for introducing me to this world. This was my first book to read on here and it has left an imprint on my mind. A memorable plot and likeable characters. I have recommended this book to my friends!

Here is my review below:

I stumbled across this book on NetGalley and feel so grateful to have had the experience of reading this book! The plot of a mother and her daughter fearing turning into trees because they cannot call anywhere home is unique and, as a lover of nature, I enjoyed this magical thought. When initially reading the description, I wondered how a whole novel could be pulled from it, as it seemed like a spoiler. Yet, the non-linear style and the variety of characters who all eventually tied together made it a captivating read. The theme of relationships between mothers and daughters was also beholding.

There were a few misleading paths that created a little fear and uncertainty in the plot. I was suspicious of the bookshop owner, and was a little disappointed he wasn’t a villain in the story. I would have also have liked the warbler to have been explained a little more/been dropped in at the beginning of the novel to build the protagonist’s connection to the bird. The twist at the end became predictable quite early on in the book.

However the predictability did not spoil the book, as it was so beautifully written. I am also pleased to see that there are plenty of other books to now delve into!

Definitely worth a read.

Thank you Netgalley & Lake Union Publishing for an arc of this book!
This one took me by surprise. The dialogue was so naturally written it felt like I was watching a vlog or tv series. The description of each scene and life around the characters was very visual as well. I really believed all scenarios; and interactions with things (cats, books, food, etc.) was especially great!
It's a light, fun, and adventurous read (with some plot holes) but fantastically written.

I feel like I start most of my reviews with "what was that" but I am going to start this one with "Sarah, was the goal to utterly destroy me and make me cry so much while reading this book?"

This book was such a great look into the complex roles women are forced to take on, the difficult each generation of women have relating to the other, and the dangers of trying to control others. It was beautiful, it was heartbreaking, it was everything I was looking for. I wish we learned more about the reason and magic of these curses, but otherwise I have no complaints.

I loved this book. It was full of magic and curses and mystery and it all came together into a satisfying conclusion. I really enjoyed making guesses into what was causing the curse and what was going to happen next.

I loved Elisa’s character, you could really see what parts of her had been made by the constant travel and the lack of emotional bonds. You could see her desire to form bounds in pretty much every interaction she had and the fear of them constantly in her mind.

The premise of this was my favourite though. The idea of constantly traveling, unable to settle down for fear of turning into a tree. It’s romantic in a way, even as it’s a terrifying fate. But I like the idea of ending my life at a time of my choosing by settling down and becoming a tree,

Overall a really great read.

Fueled by a family curse, Elisa never stays in one place more than ten months. If she stays longer, or begins to think of anywhere as home, she'll literally put down roots and turn into a tree. Elisa travels to a small town in Massachusetts that's been on her list of places where weird things have occurred, hoping someone or something there might be able to help her break the curse.

This was such a good read, and there were just a couple of small things that kept this from being a 5-star read for me. First, I wish there had been a little more explanation around the curse - mainly, how Lori figured out she was cursed, as well as how she figured out what the boundaries were and what would happen if she didn't respect them. My other issue was actually with the title. I won't spoil the big reveal, but once you understand the meaning of the title, it just felt like such a small part of the larger story that I didn't really understand why that ended up being the thing chosen to represent the entire story.

Now on to the good things. This story is told through multiple timelines so you get to know and understand not only Elisa, but also her mother Lori and her grandmother Rose. I loved getting to see each woman's individual desires and how those desires affected not only her own life but that of the next generation.

The focus of the book is definitely on the mother-daughter relationships, and there is lots of exploration of intergenerational trauma, societal expectations (especially those placed on women), and the effects of choices. While each woman experiences love, the male characters and any romantic subplots mostly take a backseat.

Read if you like:
Magical realism
Multiple timelines
Family curse & secret history
Complicated mother-daughter relationships
Bookstore cat

This is the second book I have read from this author and I was enchanted from the beginning with this one. This is one of the best beginnings I have read. I was immediately catapulted into the magical world that this author has created. I loved the blend of gothic and magical realism, however did struggle a bit with the back and forth pov shifts. I felt at times that it really drug me out of the story and I had to find my way back in and backtrack a bit. I am ready to read more. Thanks for the ARC, NetGalley. I really enjoyed the uniqueness of this book.