Ardour by Lily Prior

Ardour

Lily Prior

Arcadio is desperate to find love; when he buys and grows some love seeds the results are funny, chaotic and unexpectedly successful. With a style as lush as the results of the cloud of ardour released over the unsuspecting friends and neighbours - no one is spared the effects and that includes Gezabel, the articulate and love struck mule who tells the story.

Extract
The impulse that was ticking away in Arcadio Carnabuci was not confined to himself and the plants. No. Animals felt it too. The spiders in their spangled webs yearned for love, and spun sonnets of a fragile and unbearable beauty, glazed with tears of dew. Scorpions in dark corners clipped their castanets in courtship, and then curled up in pairs in discarded shoes, snug as bugs .... The humble newts in the waterspout sang in deep voices. The frogs and the toads joined in with them, and soon a chorus of magical croaking was filling the air. The music they made was so beautiful it made those who heard it weep and yearn for the life of an amphibian so they could unlock the secret of the song.

Parallels
  • Chocolat by Joanne Harris
  • The Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Buy this book Borrow this book
Explicit sexual content

Quirky and quizzical