A good, old fashioned romance, nicely plotted and smartly executed. It was published in the thirties and as I would love to think that my grandmother, then the young mother of three children, read this book. She loved a good romance, and she would have so enjoyed meeting Miss Charlotte Dean and learning her story.

Charlotte was an impoverished gentlewoman, living a solitary life in a small London flat, working in a small private library and losing herself in her books. And she was at a turning point in her life. She had been asked to do something, something that she knew she ought to do, but something that she didn’t want to do, something that she knew would cause her heartache. She decided to write, addressing an imaginary friend, in the hope that the act of writing would lead her to a firm decision.

She wrote the story of her life.

Charlotte was a vicar’s daughter, and she had grown up in a lovely country parish. She had an idyllic childhood, and it was illuminated by her friendship with Garth, the son and heir of the manor. It was a friendship that grew into love. But then the Great War came: Garth went and Charlotte stayed. He survived, but when he came home something quite inexplicable happened. Garth married someone else. Charlotte’s younger sister,  Kitty.

Charlotte was bewildered she was heartbroken, and so was I. she had pulled me right into her story, and my heart rose and fell with hers, I saw the world as she did.

When her beloved parents died Charlotte decided that she had to move away, that she couldn’t bear to watch her sister living the life that she had thought would be hers, with the man she still loved. And once she had left she stayed away, because she knew that the pain of going back would be too great. She visited just once, because she knew that she couldn’t refuse the invitation to be the godmother of her niece, Clementina.

It was the collapse of Kitty and Garth’s marriage that inspired Charlotte to begin to write to her imaginary friend. Kitty pulled her in, but she didn’t tell her everything. I’d love to explain exactly what happened, but I mustn’t because you need to experience it first hand, as I did alongside Charlotte.

When the dust had settled, and when she finished telling her story to her imaginary friend, Charlotte accepted that she that she had to go home, that she had to help raise Clementina.

It wasn’t easy. She had to manage the house and the staff. She had to build a relationship with a reserved, troubled child. And she had to deal with neighbours shocked at what had happened at the manor. No it wasn’t easy but Charlotte had a good heart, a wise head, and she had been raised by good people with Christian values. It wasn’t plain sailing, not by any means, but I think it’s fair to say that Charlotte succeeded.

Then she had to become the keeper of the flame, and it seemed her future was settled. She had found her place in the world, and her role in life.

But there was a final twist in the tail – the ending was absolutely perfect!

I was so sorry to have to say goodbye to Charlotte and her world, after being caught up in her life and her world from start to finish. That points to very clever writing and plotting. Charlotte’s world, the people in it, all of the things she lived through were painted richly and beautifully. Her story lived and breathed.

There were a few little niggles, but nothing really jarred. Except the imaginary friend – she was given rather too much substance and it really didn’t work; I do wish she had remained completely imaginary.

But this isn’t a book I can analyse and pick apart, because I responded to it with my heart and not my head. It came along just when I needed it, and it was a very fine romance …

I’m so glad that The Young Clementina is coming back into print, and I hope that more of D E Stevenson’s books are following along behind.

I thought I’d found a book about a woman who had fled an abusive husband, and who feared that her husband had caught up to her. I had, but the story that unfolded had far more to it than that.

There was an abusive husband; a man who belittled his wife, a man who knew where he could hurt her and leave no marks, a man who always had an answer.

There was a small market town: an insular town where people were quick to judge, where they clung to tradition, where outsiders and new ideas were resented.

And there was a newcomer: a bright, ambitious reporter sent to the town after a campaign to get more publicity for the town’s annual mediaeval fair.

The bright reporter and the downtrodden wife became friends. Real friends. Maura stood up for Kim when she made waves in the town, when she reported the negative news as well as the positive.  And Kim took steps to rebuild Maura’s self-esteem, taking her on as an assistant, and encouraging her to take steps towards a more independent lifestyle.

Maura’s husband wasn’t happy with her. The great and the good of the town weren’t happy with Kim. And when things went badly at the annual fair – bad weather and bad publicity – things boiled over. On the final day there was a terrible tragedy. Maura felt responsible, and she fled.

But five years later a journalist found her, and she realised that she had to talk about the past, deal with the past, and look to the future.

Bea Davenport tells this story very effectively. The narrative moves quite naturally between Maura’s story in the past and her telling of it in the present. And the prologue explained enough of what had happened that I could concentrate on exactly how events had unfolded without wondering who, where , when …. that brought the heart of the story into sharp focus.

It was a compelling story, simply and clearly told. The characters were real and believable, and their dialogues, their reactions, their behaviour rang true.

There were times when I found both Maura and Kim maddening. Maura should have, could have, left her husband much sooner. And Kim might have been more sensitive to the feelings of others, more aware that certain of her actions would have consequences. But at the same time, I accepted who they were – and how difficult Maura’s situation was – I saw that they were real, complex, fallible human beings.

The character of Maura’s husband was drawn with wonderful clarity and subtlety, and that made his actions all the more shocking.

Everything worked together, making a compelling human drama.

It wasn’t quite perfect – the town was a little too mediaeval, some pieces of the story fell into place a little too easily – but the story worked. It rang true psychologically. I cared about Maura, and what would become of her. I wanted to know.

I turned the pages very quickly, and I stayed up and went on reading much later than I had planned.

Ten books to transport you to Cornwall. Or to read on holiday in Cornwall.

I’ve picked books that are in print – and I think they are all available electronically – and I’ve picked wonderfully readable books, old and new, that I can happily recommend.

And her they are …

Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

“The road to Manderlay lay ahead.  There was no moon.  The sky above our heads was inky black.  But the sky on the horizon was not dark at all.  It was shot with crimson, like a splash of blood.  And the ashes blew towards us with the salt wind from the sea.”  

Daphne Du Maurier fell in love with a house named Menabilly on the north coast of Cornwall. In Rebecca she calls that house Manderlay, and she spins a wonderful tale of suspense intrigue and romance, with lovely echoes of Jane Eyre around it.

Diving Belles by Lucy Wood

Lucy Wood comes from Cornwall, she understands, really understands what makes it so special, and she mixes myth and real life to fine effect in this wonderful collection of short stories.

The Rose Garden by Susanna Kearsley

“Crossing the Tamar for some reason made me feel different inside. It was only a river, yet every time I crossed it I felt I had stepped through some mystical veil that divided the world that I only existed in from the one that I was meant to be living in.”

Susanna Kearsley captures the magic of crossing the Tamar Bridge, leaving Devon and coming into Cornwall, and she captures the magic that draws so many people here in this lovely story of a house, a garden, history, time travel, and above all romance.

Rambles Beyond Railways by Wilkie Collins

Wilkie Collins crossed the Tamar by boat, a few years before the bridge was built, and he and his friend, the artist Henry Brandling, set out on a 214 mile walking tour.  This account of their travels holds a wealth of  material, wonderful vivid writing and extraordinary insight.

Love in the Sun by Leo Walmsley

“Leo Walmsley gives the reader a true story, classic in its simplicity, of a man and a girl who possessed nothing in life but love for each other and faith in the future, and because of these things, were courageous and happy…”

So said Daphne Du Maurier, in her introduction to a story that is vividly and beautifully written. The man and the girl are utterly real, every detail rings true, and it is so easy to be pulled in, so easy to care.

Tales of Terror from the Black Ship by Chris Priestley

A visitor tells two children stories of the sea as they wait in their home, and Inn on a Cornish cliff, for the storm to abate and for their father to come home. Tales are deliciously twisted, and the final revelation – who the visitor is and why he has come – is perfect.

The Burying Beetle by Ann Kelley

This is the story of twelve year-old Gussie, who has a head full of films and books, who is fascinated by nature and the world around her home in St Ives. She is ill, waiting and hoping for a heart transplant, and that makes life all the more precious, and her story all the more life-affirming. I loved Gussie, and I loved seeing Cornwall through her eyes.

Peril at End House by Agatha Christie

On holiday at a Cornish hotel Poirot encounters an accident-prone heiress, and  he soon realises that her accidents are not accidents at all. A solid mystery, a very nice setting; all in all, a lovely period piece from the 1930s.

Penmarric by Susan Howatch

A wonderful family saga, spanning half a century, telling their story and the story of Penmarric, their grand Cornish home, in five voices. The house, its inhabitants, the world around them come to life in a dramatic, compelling story. I had no idea when I first read it that it was inspired by real mediaeval history ….

The First Wife by Emily Barr

The story of a girl from a Cornish village who loses her home when her grandparents die, moves to town, and finds herself caught up in a story elements of chick lit, strands of a psychological thriller, and echoes of Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca. It’s wonderful fun!

I’m waiting now for Emily Barr’s new book, the story of a woman whop disappears from the train between Penzance and Paddington. A train I have travelled on so many times …

There are more books of course, by these authors and by others.

Have any of these books, or have any other books, transported you to Cornwall, I wonder … ?

Could it be the father she never knew?

The father who named her:

“Dot he thought, let her be Dot. because she is a beginning. A tiny dot of life that will grow into something wonderful.”

Dot didn’t know that.

“A dot is the smallest, most insignificant thing there is. And it’s a full stop, so an ending. I mean, who on earth would call their child Dot?’

She didn’t know anything at all about him. She knew that she wanted know, but she knew that she probably shouldn’t ask her mother or her grandmother. Her mother, Alice, was lovely but she was fragile, and she had been withdrawn and vague ever since her husband left. And her  grandmother, Clarice, had only been able to cope with her own husband’s death, years earlier, by becoming the keeper of the house, the upholder of proprieties.

This is the story of the grandmother, the mother, and the daughter. It’s the story of another mother and daughter: Mavis and her mother Sandra. And it’s the story of Dot’s absent father.

Araminta Hall moves backwards and forwards in time, to meet them all at defining points in their lives. The voices are distinctive, the character are believable, and as I learned more I really felt that I knew them better, I understood their relationships better. Because, of course, these stories overlap and have consequences for each other.

Each and every character holds onto secrets, and seems unable to talk about the things that are really important to them. And  there are consequences, of course there are. Relationships between mothers and daughters, men and women, that are sometimes undermined and sometimes fractured.

Araminta Hall has the knack of illuminating ordinary lives, understanding that everybody has a story to tell, and making those lives fascinating.

All of the big things are there – birth, marriage, death – but it is the understanding of little things that really make this book sing.

The observation is acute, and there’s a lovely thread of humour running through this very human story.

I was drawn in, I cared, and I wanted to know.

Two years ago, when I read Araminta Hall’s first novel, I wrote.

“… on the evidence of this book, I fully expect Araminta Hall to write a “wow” book before too long …”

This isn’t quite a “wow” book, but it’s a wonderful progression from her first novel, and I’m happy to stand by belief that there will be one, one day in the not too distant future.

There are worse – and more expensive – sins!

But I have to catch up with myself because this week I took just one book – that I didn’t get on with – back, and I picked up four reservations.

My library ticket will only stretch so far!

The Sea Sisters by Lucy Clarke

“There are some currents in the relationship between sisters that run so dark and deep, it’s better for people on the surface never to know what’s beneath …”

I love stories about sisters, I love stories about the sea, and so I had to order this one.

The Promise by Ann Weisgarber

“I read Oscar’s letter again. He offered escape from my debts, from my mother’s rejection, and from certain poverty. He offered escape from myself.”

This went on to my ‘please put it into stock’ list when Lindsey wrote about it, and when I spotted it going into stock I jumped into the queue. I’ve nearly finished this one, and I’m impressed …

Dot by Araminta Hall

“Dot he thought, let her be Dot. because she is a beginning. A tiny dot of life that will grow into something wonderful.”

I liked Araminta Hall’s first novel, this looked like an interesting progression, and when Naomi wrote about Dot I just had to place an order. I’ve read just the first few chapters, and I’m intrigued …

The Curious Habits of Doctor Adams: a 1950′s Murder Mystery by Jane Robins

“Was Mrs Gertrude Hullet murdered at her luxurious 15-room house on Beachy Head? detectives are trying to establish the cause of the 50-year-old widow’s sudden death …”

I was impresses with Jane Robins’ first book – an account of the brides in the bath case that mixed intrigue, biography and social history – and so when I saw she had written another, about a case I knew nothing about, I ordered it straight away.

I’m quite taken with the fact that my library loot is colour coordinated this week.

And I’m pleased that I’ll be able to take a couple of books back this weekend, because there are already more reservations waiting …

I went looking for a copy, and it took a while, because it wasn’t in print in the UK at the time, but I found a lovely old copy that wasn’t too expensive. I enjoyed owning it and admiring it, I enjoyed the prospect of reading a lovely book. Reading isn’t the only pleasure in book ownership!

Earlier this year I spotted a reissue, and I decided it was time to take my book off the shelf and read.

I loved it!

the Blue Castle tells the story of Valancy Stirling. She is twenty years old and she is trapped in the role of spinster daughter, living with her widowed mother and her Cousin Stickles. They treat her like a child, restrict her like a child, and make her feel that she is a burden and a disappointment to them. They don’t listen. None of her extended family, who live around and about a Canadian country town. They tease her, they laugh at her, but they don’t listen. Nobody listens.

Valancy escapes into her head, where she has created a rich fantasy world that she shares with her dashing prince in her beautiful Blue Castle.

“Valancy had lived spiritually in the Blue castle ever since she could remember. She had been a very tiny child when she found herself possessed of it. Always, when she shut her eyes, she could see it plainly, with its turrets and banners on the pine clad mountain height, wrapped in its faint blue loveliness, against the sunset skies of a fair and unknown land. Everything wonderful and beautiful was in that castle. Jewels that queen might have worn; robes of moonlight and fire; couches of roses and gold; long flights of shallow marble steps, with great white urns, and with slender, mist-clad maidens, going up and down them; courts, marble-pillared, where shimmering fountains fell and nightingales sung among the myrtles; halls of mirrors that reflected only handsome knights and lovely women – herself the loveliest of all, for whose glance med died…”

And she escapes into her books, especially into the works of naturalist John Foster. Nothing was more magical to Valancy than nature.

When her birthday dawns Valancy awakes to the realisation that imagination and books are not enough, and that she has to do something, anything, to change her life.

She begins with one small trip: a solo trip to the doctor, to talk privately about a strange feeling in her heart that has been worrying her for quite some time. The news is shocking: the doctor tells her that she has just one year to live.

Valancy decides that in that year she will live. Really live! She spoke her mind, she stood up to her family. She tore up the rule book and followed her instinct instead. And then she decided to move out, to nurse a sick school-friend, the daughter of the town drunk who was ostracised by the town when she bore an illegitimate child. Valancy was happy keeping house, having someone to care for, being needed and appreciated.

When Valancy’s friend died her family thought that she would come home, that she would settle down again. But she did something worse. She took up with someone else who had been ostracised by town society, a friend of her friends. And she married him. They lived together in his country home, and Valancy was blissfully happy. At the very end of her life she had found her Blue Castle, and her handsome prince.

It felt like a happy ending, but of course it wasn’t that simple …

I fell in love with Valancy on the very first page, and I lived and breathed with her to the very last page. My heart rose and fell so many times, I wanted to cheer for her, I wanted to weep for her, and most of all I wanted to hug her. I loved her spirit and I loved the spirit of her story.

L M Montgomery catches everything: the sadness of Valancy’s constrained life; the selfish, snobbish, thoughtlessness of her family; the pleasures in life and friendship that she discovers; the vitality of her rebellion; the joy to be found in simple pleasures; the romance of what might be her happy ending …

And there were so, so many rich, vivid descriptions to get lost in.

“Sometimes they took a lunch with them and went berrying–strawberries and blueberries. How pretty blueberries were–the dainty green of the unripe berries, the glossy pinks and scarlets of the half ripes, the misty blue of the fully matured! And Valancy learned the real flavour of the strawberry in its highest perfection. There was a certain sunlit dell on the banks of Mistawis along which white birches grew on one side and on the other still, changeless ranks of young spruces. There were long grasses at the roots of the birches, combed down by the winds and wet with morning dew late into the afternoons. Here they found berries that might have graced the banquets of Lucullus, great ambrosial sweetnesses hanging like rubies to long, rosy stalks. They lifted them by the stalk and ate them from it, uncrushed and virgin, tasting each berry by itself with all its wild fragrance ensphered therein. When Valancy carried any of these berries home that elusive essence escaped and they became nothing more than the common berries of the market-place–very kitchenly good indeed, but not as they would have been, eaten in their birch dell until her fingers were stained as pink as Aurora’s eyelids. Sometimes they went trouting on little nameless rivers or hidden brooks on whose banks Naiads might have sunned their white, wet limbs. Then all they took with them were some raw potatoes and salt. They roasted the potatoes over a fire and Barney showed Valancy how to cook the trout by wrapping them in leaves, coating them with mud and baking them in a bed of hot coals. Never were such delicious meals.”

But I do have to say though that the plot is a little stretched, that it does go on rather – even as I was reading happily I found myself thinking from time to time that I had got it, that she didn’t need to labour the point, that it was time to move things along. And that she laid on the romance and sentimentality far too thickly in the later chapters.

But now I’ve gone on. It’s that sort of book!

I did love The Blue Castle, I just need to remember that it is a book that needs the right moment. A sentimental, leisurely, comfort-reading kind of moment …

Tamura and Aaron were happy in their marriage; they were content with the life they had built, on a smallholding, on the outskirts of a small town near the coast of California; and they were so very proud of their thirteen year-old daughter Satomi.

Satomi wasn’t so sure that she belonged – she felt that she was neither Japanese or American – but she was bright, she was popular, and she had caught the eye of the most eligible boy in the school. She was happy.

But war was looming. Aaron felt that he had to do his duty, he wanted to demonstrate that he and his family were loyal American subjects, and because he never wanted to be too far away from the sea he joined the navy.

He was sent to Pearl Harbour, and he died there when the Japanese attacked. When the news broke neighbours who had known the family for years turned on Tamura and Satomi. And their government turned on them too, forcing them to leave their home, everything they owned, everything they had worked for and live in terrible conditions in an internment camp set high in the mountains of Colorado.

Maureen Lindley tells Tamura and Satomi’s story simply and clearly, and in a style that is beautifully understated. The real history speaks for itself, and beautifully drawn characters and well chose details bring the story to life.

Satomi wants to rebel, to speak out, but she knows that she must protect her mother, who is lost in grief for her beloved husband and bewildered by the actions of her birth.

Maureeen Lindley’s account of life in the internment camp is both thoughtful and moving. Conditions are difficult, but a supportive community grows. Satomi comes to appreciate that community, her Japanese heritage, and most of all her mother, whose instinct is always to, quietly and thoughtfully, support others, to be a mother, a sister, a friend to whoever might need her.

When the war ends, when the internment camp closes, Satomi must face the future alone. She still faces prejudice and hostility, but she has learnt from her mother, she gains support from the relationships forged in the camp, and she prevails.

This part of the story is less successful than what came before. To some degree this was inevitable, because after the war could never be as dramatic as during the war, but there were elements of the story that seemed far fetched, and more suited to a straightforward romantic novel. I couldn’t help feeling that there was a more interesting story that might have been told.

But Satomi’s character, her emotions, her reactions, rang true. Her journey was right, it was just the details that were wrong.

Her story spoke of love, loss, and survival. it spoke of changing, learning, adapting, and growing.

It shows easily humanity is lost in the face of ignorance, jealousy, and most of all fear; and it shows that there are people, who will stand up to try to do the right thing, to try to do good in the face of all of that.

It taught me an aspect of history I knew little about, though a moving, engaging, and very human story.

For all of those reasons, I am very glad that I read A Girl Like You.

I’ve tried to strike a balance between not ordering too many books and not forgetting about them by using the list making facilities on my library’s website. I have a ‘soon’ list, a ‘maybe one day’ list and a ‘please put it into stock’ list.

A few weeks ago I ditched the idea of restricting library reservations and changed my project into one to celebrate the magic of library reservations.

I’ve tried to strike a balance between not ordering too many books and not forgetting about them by using the list making facilities on my library’s website. I have a ‘soon’ list, a ‘maybe one day’ list and a ‘please put it into stock’ list.

They are growing at a healthy rate, and reminding me that I need never run out of great books, and I don’t need to break the bank to but them all

And here’s list of ten interesting prospects for the future:

Heroines & Harlots: Women at Sea in the Great Age of Sail by David Cordingly

I really don’t remember how I found this one, but I love the title, I love stories of the sea, and so I popped it on a list.

Memories: incorporating Perverse and Foolish and Memory in a House by Lucy M Boston

I read such praise for Lucy M Boston’s two volumes of memoirs that I had to look for a copy. I found one, but I was distracted by Yew Hall, her one novel for adults, and so this one went in to a list to be ordered another day.

The Knot by Jane Borodale

“When Henry Lyte brings his young bride Frances home to his Somerset estate, he hopes she will share in his devotion to the garden – a refuge of fruit trees and flower beds, with a knot of herbs at its heart. Henry is a scholar, and his life’s work is his ‘herbal’ – a book of plants and their medicinal properties, intended for those who cannot afford physicians’ expensive cures.But life on the edges of the flood plains makes Frances uneasy, and there are strange rumours abroad concerning the death of Henry’s first wife – rumours that can be traced to Henry’s step-mother Joan Young, a grasping woman eager to seize control of the family’s lands. And while Henry cannot tear himself from his studies, he stands the risk of losing everything he loves.”

I liked Jane Borodale’s first novel – with just a few reservation – but I think this could be lovely – and a real progression – so I out it on the list, ready to order when the historical novel reading bug next strikes.

The Cornish Fox by C H B Kitchin

I spotted Streamers Waving by C H B Kitchin in the Faber Finds catalogue, I liked the look of it, I read it, I loved it, and it slotted nicely into my Century of Books. When I looked to see if the library had any more of his books I was intrigued by this title. I haven’t been able to find out anything about it, but I’ve added it to my list to be read one day when the century is done.

The Hive: the Story of the Honeybee and Us by Bee Wilson

Bee Wilson’s Consider The Fork has been on my bedside table for ages. It’s lovely, but it’s a dipping into and reading the same bit over and over again kind of book, and I don’t really want to reach the end. But I checked to see if Bee Wilson had written anything else, and I found this, and listed it to order when I finish my consideration of forks. And not just forks pretty much anything else you might find in a kitchen too …

Pied Piper by Nevil Shute

I read a few of Nevil Shutes’ novels from my parents’ shelves back when I first started reading grown-up books. They didn’t have this one, but Darlene gave it a very warm recommendation, and that’s a good enough reason to add it to my library lists.

The White Lie by Andrea Gillies

“On a hot summer’s afternoon, Ursula Salter runs sobbing from the loch on her parents’ Scottish estate and confesses, distraught, that she has killed Michael, her 19 year old nephew. But what really happened? No body can be found, and Ursula’s story is full of contradictions. In order to protect her, the Salters come up with another version of events, a decision that some of them will come to regret. Years later, at a family gathering, a witness speaks up and the web of deceit begins to unravel.”

I ordered this not long after it was published, but I couldn’t find the time to read it before I had to return to, to be passed on to the next person in the queue. This was before I could make lists on my library account and I nearly forgot it, but Cat wrote about it not so long ago, and I listed it to make sure I don’t forget it again.

Lucy Carmichael by Margaret Kennedy

I’ve fallen in love with Margaret Kennedy’s writing, and I’m slowly working my way through a number of her books that the library has in reserve stock. This one is next. because I love the idea of the story – a heroine jilted on her wedding day strikes out on a new path in life – and because it will fill a vacant year on my Century of Books.

And Then There Was One by Joyce Dennys

I stumble across this childhood memoir purely by chance, and I listed it ready to order once I’ve read Joyce Dennys’s  much loved Henrietta novels. I own the first, and I’ve spotted a copy of the second in my local library.

To Serve Them All My Days by R F Delderfield

This is another book I read from my parents’s shelves years ago – and I remember a very good television adaptation too. I was delighted to spot it when I was looking to fill difficult years in my Century of Books, checked the library catalogue, found a copy, and listed it so I wouldn’t forget.

…. and that’s ten!