From the Bookshelf of 2025 & 2026 Reading Challenge…

The Lost Apothecary

Sarah Penner

Start date: October 1, 2021

Finish date: October 31, 2021

Discussion: October 2025 Group Read

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of -3 topics — 120 comments total

October 2025 Group Read

Weyward: Mid-Reading Discussion
By Winter , Group Reads · 10 posts · 61 views

last updated Oct 23, 2025 01:40PM

Weyward: Pre-Reading Discussion
By Winter , Group Reads · 10 posts · 55 views

last updated Oct 18, 2025 05:57AM

showing 10 of 118 topics view all »

What Members Thought

Jul 05, 2021 Ami rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery, chick-lit, historical, contemporary, audio-books, 18th-century, 21st-century, the-uk, mpov, 2021

One Sad Star. The cover is beautiful, super intriguing synopsis, everyone was raving and I waited months for it but the narrators were poorly chosen and it came incredibly close to being a DNF. I only completed it to answer a couple of questions that arose while reading a few reviews.

This should have been amazing, but everything is so improbable, outlandish, unrealistic and unimaginative that I'm tempted to mark this as science-fiction and alternate reality.

The contemporary main character is inc ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Apr 07, 2021 Jennifer rated it really liked it

The cover to this book is so pretty!! This is a story of an Apothecary that serves women and provides poisons to kill off the men that have betrayed them. Nella's, the Apothecary, and Eliza's story takes place during the late 1700s. Caroline's, a wanna be historical investigator, takes place in current times in London on a lone getaway vacation. Caroline finds a vial labeled with a bear that looks to have belonged to an Apothecary. Caroline, who is facing life alternating decisions due to a ...more

1 like · Like · see review

May 16, 2022 Susan rated it it was amazing

LOVED LOVED LOVED THIS BOOK!!!

The concept of this book was what made me want to read it to begin with. A women distributing poisons from her mother's apothecary shop. Nella is the owner and the one woman who is able to help women get the revenge on their lying, cheating, abusive men in their lives. She helps them kill these men without anyone knowing any wrong doing was done to the men. They are men that have taken advantage of their very young h I housemaids. Like Eliza. She was Mr. and Mrs. A ...more

1 like · Like · see review

Jun 20, 2022 Marianne Stehr rated it liked it

This is a fast paced read, read it in just a few hours. It is not a literary dynamo, it is a cute little story, with a few flips and flops. To me the better story lies with Eliza and Nalla not Caroline and James, but I understand the motive to compare the eras and try to put some mystique to the story. I don't buy it, but that is why I gave it 3 stars. Just to me, not much substance, I felt like the bigger story was out there, but not told. ...more

Like · see review

May 15, 2023 Jen rated it liked it

Entertaining, but of the dual storylines, the ‘modern’ tale is weak and uninteresting.

Like · see review

Oct 29, 2022 Kara rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, audible, book-club

I read this book for my book club... I am not sure I would have found this otherwise. I absolutely loved it! I loved the story. I loved the narration! I just loved everything about it.
I have no doubt it will be one of my favorite books of 2022!

Like · see review