"Claire was getting good at making a clean cut when she harvested vegetables from the ground. The secret was to keep your wide-face knife very sharp and come across squarely in one stroke. She loved the sound of the fresh, bursting snap."
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25,000 Seeds: Where Love Grows by Helen Noble Balboa Press
book review by Caroline Blaha-Black
Claire Patterson, a Palm Beach resident, finds herself in the small town of Salinger in rural Ohio, when the town's school administrator hires her to design an after-school child care program for local children. Surrounded by friends, family, and having a great career, a gallery-hopping, fashionable Claire is apprehensive at first about spending the summer in Salinger. However, overtime she realizes that she loves the rural life and the people of Salinger and finds out what has been missing out of her picture-perfect Palm Beach life so far. While performing her duties and building the new school, she makes new friends and realizes that there have been things she's been missing in her life. She befriends Charity, a farmer's wife, who struggles with body-image and happiness issues, and she meets Ben, a local wealthy farmer, who teaches her about farming. Claire also rekindles her love for cooking and cycling. In the end, she comes to terms with her divorce and falls in love with Ben.
Noble's book is a well-written account of a woman coming to terms with her life after divorce, reconciling past hurts, and reaching happiness at her full potential. Readers can easily identify with Claire as she makes her life in Salinger, cycles daily, meditates, and makes mouth-watering dishes that she prepares from local ingredients for her new friends. The recipes that Claire creates are scattered throughout the book, so readers can easily try them on their own. Among these delicious dishes are, for example, asparagus, pancetta, and leek sauté and kitchen sink cookies.
The author presents a fast-paced narrative and displays a vast managerial knowledge of how to build an after-school child care center, which is Claire's job in the book. A perfect read for women after the age of 40, it shows them that there is a fantastic life waiting ahead, and they can sow the seeds of happiness in their lives anytime they wish.