Book Review: The Magic of Lemon Drop Pie

Book #71 for 2025: The Magic of Lemon Drop Pie by Rachel Linden, 3/5 ★
352 pages / published August 2022 / available here

Goodreads blurb: Lolly Blanchard's life only seems to give her lemons. Ten years ago, after her mother's tragic death, she broke up with her first love and abandoned her dream of opening a restaurant in order to keep her family's struggling Seattle diner afloat and care for her younger sister and grieving father. Now, a decade later, she dutifully whips up the diner's famous lemon meringue pies each morning while still pining for all she's lost. As Lolly's thirty-third birthday approaches, her quirky great-aunt gives her a mysterious gift—three lemon drops, each of which allows her to live a single day in a life that might have been hers. What if her mom hadn't passed away? What if she had opened her own restaurant in England? What if she hadn't broken up with the only man she's ever loved? Surprising and empowering, each experience helps Lolly let go of her regrets and realize the key to transforming her life lies not in redoing her past but in having the courage to embrace her present.

My review: While not my typical read, I’ve had this one on my TBR for over a year because the baking element (or so I thought) and the magical realism. In actuality, the protagonist isn’t much of a baker (or cook at all for that matter), but the story is still sweet nonetheless. As an eldest daughter who lost a parent, I could absolutely resonate with Lolly’s emotional turmoil and need to hold everything together. The lemon-drop-alternate-timeline scenes were interesting, though I struggled to feel like any of the characters were as fleshed out as they could’ve been…maybe except for the great-aunt. A bit saccharine, I was unsurprised to read that it was turned into a Hallmark movie, though the preview I watched looked like it really did a disservice to what is actually a sweet, heartfelt, if somewhat underwhelmong, book. For fans of light women’s fiction and the Hallmark channel, The Magic of Lemon Drop Pie will be a great read. A happy ending can be expected.