Fresh Water for Flowers is an extraordinary, moving tribute to the resilience of the human spirit. I must admit that I don’t remember the last time I was so deeply touched by a story. This book hugs you, offering comfort and countless moments of tenderness, while evoking profound emotions filled with wonderful references to French music and literature.
This tale unfolds around a small graveyard in a French town in Bourgogne. We meet an array of interesting, nuanced characters, including our main protagonist, Violette. The story of Violette’s life is slowly revealed through her own words and through her connections with the lives of others: her difficult childhood, being born with nothing, her tragic marriage to Philippe, her daughter, her years working as a bartender, then as a level-crossing keeper, and finally her life as a cemetery caretaker.
“A man of fifty-five died from smoking too much (…). They never say that a man of fifty-five can die from not having been loved, not having been heard, getting too many bills, buying too much on credit (…). No one ever says that you can die from having been too fed up, too often.”
At one point, Violette says that others speak about her life as though she does not exist—as though she is a problem to be solved, not a person; as though she is absent from her own story. Throughout her life, she is often diminished by others, degraded, mistreated, and looked down upon.
I don’t want to share too much about the story itself, so as not to spoil the pleasure of reading this magnificent book for others.
Fresh Water for Flowers is a tale about difficult love, mature love, grief, loneliness, God, death, the absence of those we love, and the relationships between people and their animal companions. It offers many insightful observations about the relationships between parents and their adult children, and about finding love later in life.
Violette has become one of my favourite literary characters. Despite the many tragedies and hardships she endures, she remains sensitive, gentle, thoughtful, and non-judgmental in her relationships with others. She is a keen observer of human fragility and relationships, filled with enormous empathy for those she encounters.
This is a profoundly sad story, yet at the same time it leaves the reader with a sense of hope and faith in the strength of the human heart.
Perrin’s writing is sublime—elegant, lyrical, melancholic, and simply beautiful. It is some of the finest writing I have read in years.
I highly recommend this book to anyone in need of a gentle read. Fresh Water for Flowers by Valérie Perrin will offer readers many moments of comfort, bliss, and true reading delight. It is one of those rare books that soothes the soul. Words cannot describe how much I loved this story.
