The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart follows the life of the titular character after she has to move in with her grandmother when her parents die in a fire. The series is streaming on Prime Video.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary:
Alice Hart lived with her abusive father, Clem, and her mother, Agnes, who was expecting another child. Clem would often beat Alice for minor reasons but try and smooth things over with acts of kindness.
Agnes planned on leaving her husband but couldn’t build up the courage to go through with it. One day, Agnes had promised Alice that they would go into town but Agnes stayed in bed so Alice went by herself.
She met the local librarian, Sally Morgan, who noticed bruises on Alcie’s arm and call her husband, John, who was a local police officer. Alice ran back home before and John showed up after to check on her.
They blamed the bruises on the dog playing around with Alice and after John left, Clem beat Alice up again. John had also dropped off some books that Sally figured Alice would enjoy and one of them was about myths and legends about fire gods.
Alice got the idea to set fire to her father because of this book, and she also drew a liking to a book about mermaids and freedom. When Agnes and Clem were out one day, Alice snuck into Clem’s shed and accidentally started a fire.
The whole family eventually ended up in the hospital with Alice being the only one to survive, although she was heavily bruised and in a coma.
Clem’s mother, June Hart shows up to see her family after she finds out what happened and she tells John she wasn’t in contact with Clem in years and didn’t know Agnes.
Sally is hoping to adopt Alice after they lost their own daughter to cancer many years ago. However, since June is the next of kin, she chooses to take her instead, much to Sally’s disappointment.
The doctor calls June and tells her that Agnes son has slim chances of survival but might just make it, but June doesn’t want to take him in so she makes other arrangements without telling anyone.
Alice isn’t able to talk because of the trauma to her neck and uses a notepad to communicate. June takes her to her estate called Thornfield, a flower farm and safe haven for women who are survivors of abusive households.
She meets Twig, June’s partner, and Candy Blue, Clem’s adoptive sister. Alice spends her days learning about everything that they do in Thornfield, meeting the other “flowers” or survivors.
She also learns the language that the Harts developed through flowers. Each flower has a different significance and they use these to communicate sentiments with each other.
Alice meets Oggi, a young boy and the son of a former flower, and they become close friends. She eventually finds out that Agnes also lived at Thornfield for a while and asks June to tell her everything.
June is very protective of her family and refuses to tell Alice everything until she starts talking again. When Alice eventually does, June tells all about how they fell in love before Clem left with her because June told him that he would not inherit the farm.
Years pass by and a grown-up Alice is frantically searching for something in June’s office. She leaves in a rush and doesn’t tell anyone where she’s going.
June is suffering from cancer and is in the hospital. When she comes back home and sees the mess, she begins to worry as everyone begins searching for Alice.
Alice heads to a town called Agnes Bluff where she meets the local veterinarian, Moss. She hooks up with him and he introduces her to the rangers of a local reserve.
Alice ran away because she found out that June had Oggi deported and kept all of his communications from Alice. Alice and Oggi planned to elope so June decided to take matters into her own hands.
Alice eventually found out when she received a letter from Oggi telling her that he was getting married to someone else. Candy finds out that June hid this from her, and they soon find out that Alice’s brother, Charlie, survived and is living with Sally Morgan.
Alice becomes a ranger at the reserve and starts dating a fellow ranger named Dylan but he turns out to be abusive. She goes along for a while until fighting back eventually.
June is dying because of the cancer and before she goes, she wants to make amends for all of the secrets that she kept during her life. When Candy was a young girl, she was very close to Clem but he ended up raping her so June sent her away for a while.
She also says that the man she would tell everyone was Clem’s father, was actually Roberta, a woman whom she was briefly in love with but could never follow through on.
Alice calls June and Twig to get her after a rough night with Dylan and she learns about Charlie. She finally meets him and lives with Sally for a while to get to know him better.
June is close to her final moments and hopes that Alice can forgive her for everything she did.
The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart ending explained in detail:
What was June’s story?
June admits to Candy that one time when she was hanging out with Roberta, three boys came along and raped her after June helped Roberta escape. She never contacted Roberta after that and Clem was born from this despicable act.
She asks Candy to write a letter to Roberta but later learns that Roberta passed away many years ago. June always felt that Clem was damaged and she believed he might be good for Agnes.
She kept Charlie a secret because she was worried he might be like Clem.
What actually happened on the day Agnes and Clem died?
Alice always believed that she was the reason the fire started and she blamed herself for her parents’ death. When she returns to see Sally, she is shown the inquisition into their deaths.
There, it was deduced that Agnes had been planning to escape for a long time and set a date too. Then on the day that Alice started the fire, Clem beat her up and choked her close to death until Agnes took a stick and beat Clem in the head.
She then set him and the house on fire after helping Alice escape. By the time paramedics arrive, Agnes was suffering from smoke inhalation and ultimately didn’t survive but saved her daughter.
What happens after June’s death?
June passes away peacefully without hearing Alice’s last words to her. She leaves behind letters for all of her family, with Twig getting one expressing how much she loved her and appreciates her for coming into her life.
She writes another one to Candy in which she tells Candy how much she cared for her and the reasons behind everything that she had done to protect her from Clem. She loved her like a daughter and apologizes for not making it seem that way.
Alice receives a book with all the stories of the flowers that showed up at Thornfield over the years, as a reminder of what they persevered through and evidence that things can get better.
Also Read: The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart review: Incredibly poignant but equally tedious
