The Fair Botanists

BY SARA SHERIDAN HODDER & STOUGHTON £16.99 

Dedicated ‘to the lovers who vowed to wed in secret during lockdown’, Sheridan hints at the intense romance of this piece of historical fiction from the off – and it lives up to expectation. Enlightenment Edinburgh is in the throes of tumultuous change, and newly widowed Elizabeth finds solace in the city’s Botanic Gardens. Everything from the scents to the textures are heady. The multiple machinations of love, perfume and botany keep the pages turning. An intriguing exploration of female independence in a man’s world.