Head Over Heels – Jill Mansell

Jessie has kept the identity of her son Oliver's father a secret for years. She's stunned when she discovers that the man in question, actor Toby Gillespie, has just moved in next door. The truth's about to come out.  

One glance at Oliver, and a little mental arithmetic, and Toby has the situation sussed. Meeting the son he never knew he had is the shock of a lifetime. It's a shock, too, for Toby's wife, the beautiful Deborah, though she seems to take it in her stride. 

Would Deborah be so relaxed if she knew just how close Toby wants to get to the mother of his firstborn? As the attraction between them flares up again, Jessie just can't see her way to a happy ending. But no one is quite what they seem, and there are more surprises to come...

My Rating 5/5 Easy Read (Fiction)

I loved this book from the very first page. 

The White Marriage – Charlotte Bingham

Sunny’s mundane country life is changed over night when handsome, stylish Gray’s Bentley breaks down outside her parents’ cottage in Rushington. It seems that he may have fallen in love with her. Although Sunny herself remains unconvinced, her best friend Arietta believes that Sunny is soon to be set on the road to wealth and happiness.

Shortly after meeting Gray for the second time at a local ball, Sunny is invited out by his close friend, the beautiful socialite, Leandra Fortescue, who tells her over lunch that Gray wants to marry her if she will accept certain conditions. Sunny does accept, even as Arietta is leaving Rushington to work in London.

Sunny soon joins Arietta at her cheerfully chaotic lodgings. It is here that she realizes that she can find the sort of contentment that has eluded sophisticates such as Gray and Leandra. Here too she meets Hart and, despite being engaged to Gray, falls in love with him, just as Arietta has fallen for his friend, jazz-playing painter, Sam. By chance Arietta comes into a secret about Gray, but is afraid to tell Sunny, and yet not to tell her might ruin her future.

My Rating 5/5 Easy Read (Fiction)

After the first few pages of this book I thought I was not going to like it, that it was not really my type of book.  I carried on and found it a  real page turner.

Annie’s Girl – Maureen Coppinger

Maureen Coppinger’s earliest memory is of watching the woman she believed to be her mother walk away and abandon her to the care of the nuns at one of Ireland’s notorious industrial schools. She was just three years old. 

She remained in the orphanage until the age of 16, subjected to cruelty and neglect, and starved of love and affection. Throughout these tormented years, Maureen dreamed only of escape, and when she was contacted again by her mammy she believed all her dreams were about to come true. Life in the outside world brought its own challenges, however, and Maureen was thrown into turmoil when she discovered that the truth about her past was more murky than she had ever realised.

Annie’s Girl stands apart as a poignant testimony to the resilience of the human heart. This touching and evocative memoir is the incredible story of an illegitimate industrial school survivor’s profound struggle to overcome a shame-filled past and solve the mystery of her origins.

My Rating 5/5 Heartbreaking (Autobiography)

So sad.  I really wanted it to carry on for a few more years and not end as it did as I felt that I needed to know more.

Maybe there will be a follow-up book.

My Whispering Angels – Francesca Brown

My Whispering Angels is the extraordinary story of an ordinary Irish wife and mother blessed with an incredible gift.

Francesca faced the dawn of the new millennium debilitated by ill-health and despair, without any hope or faith in her future. This was until the loving angels and spirits that she remembered watching over her as a young girl returned to save her in adulthood.

We are taken on a wondrous journey of self-discovery as Francesca describes how her angels helped her to recover from her illness and led her to a profound spiritual healing. The angels taught her how to use her gift to help others and to use her insight to guide them to lives enriched with hope and purpose.

Francesca's remarkable story is a testament to the transformations that can occur if you open your eyes and your heart to hope.

My Rating 5/5 Loved This Book (Non-Fiction)

Daughter Of Mine – Anne Bennett

Lizzie finds that life in the Birmingham blitz is hard. Her husband is away fighting in the war and her children have been sent to Donegal for safety.  She’s grateful for her job in munitions but not so happy when that means going home in the blackout.

On one cold, foggy night she is attacked.  She comes round, battered and bruised, unable to remember the details.  As there is nobody to help her bear the consequences, she must turn in desperation to her own parents.  They do their best but Lizzie is almost destroyed by the future they arrange.

All her life Lizzie has let other people make decisions for her.  Now, faced with daily cruelty, a fresh resolve is born.  Her father declares that she’s no daughter of his – but Lizzie makes the biggest decision of her life, to save her own child.  And from this point, no-one will tell her what to do ever again.

My Rating 5/5 Loved This Book (Fiction)

Easy read, I could not put it down.

Founded On Fear – Peter Tyrrell

I warn society against the child who has been hurt Peter Tyrrell 

A tormented childhood in Letterfrack industrial school with the Christian Brothers left an enduring mark on Peter Tyrrell. Ignored by the authorities and distressed by his memories, he later burned himself to death on Hampstead Heath in London. His story of horrific abuse is told with childlike simplicity, penned in a series of letters to Senator Owen Sheehy Skeffington. Bringing to life, with touching sincerity, a shocking reality where beatings of children as young as five were commonplace, this startling account may have gone unpublished if not for its chance discovery amongst Skeffington’s papers. At last, Peter Tyrrell has been given a voice. 

Tyrrell never recovered from the abuse that he suffered, yet was determined that his story should be heard. His memoir makes for harrowing yet extraordinarily compelling reading. It is impossible not to be touched.

My Rating 5/5 Heartbreaking (Memoir)

When Daylight Comes – Lyn Andrews

Jessica Brennan is just nineteen years old when her world falls apart.  Losing her father at sea was devastating enough, but the death of her mother is almost too much to bear.  The grieving has barely begun when Jess learns that the family business is in ruins, but there are further blows to come.  Jess’s brother Patrick is determined to gamble with what little they have left...

Suddenly a young woman who has known only comfort and security finds herself alone and friendless.  But Jess is a fighter and in her darkest hour she finds the strength she needs to start again.  From buying and selling dyed feathers as hat trimmings, Jess gradually establishes a business that can support not only herself and Tilly, a little girl she rescues from the streets, but also Patrick.  Tragedy, however, is just around the corner, leaving Jess more determined than ever to regain the happiness and security she once had...

My Rating 5/5 Loved This Book (Fiction/Saga)

Good easy read, set in Liverpool.

My Psychic Life – Sally Morgan

Sally Morgan is an ordinary woman with an extraordinary gift: she can communicate with the dead.

Sally saw her first ghost at the age of four.  Since then she has been speaking to spirits and passing on their messages, hopes and fears to the living with astonishing accuracy.

It took first-hand experiences of intense conflict and personal turmoil, as well as a particular disaster in Sally's life to help her understand how to take control of the mysteries of the spirit world and become a professional medium.  She has now given thousands of readings for people who have experienced personal tragedy or suffered great loss.  Packed with amazing anecdotes that will send a shiver down the spine, this is Sally’s remarkable story.

My Rating 5/5 (Autobiography)

I watched Sally on TV and was amazed. I then went to one of her live shows and was very impressed. I bought the book at the show and met Sally she signed my book. I couldn't put this book down, it has small chapters so if you want to you can just have a few minutes here and there. I read in bed before I go to sleep so I thought it may scare me. It didn't! I found it fascinating.

Mother’s Only Child – Anne Bennett

Maria is a girl with great talent for design.  Although the world is embroiled in war, all she can think of is her scholarship to study in Dublin.  But then her father has a dreadful accident and her mother breaks down in guilt and grief.  Maria, the only child, must care for them both.  Her hopes are dashed, not only of her career, but of marrying the one who’s loved her for years.

Reluctantly, Maria is driven into the arms of the supposedly reliable Barney.  But no such thing.  The young couple have to leave the village in a hurry and settle in Birmingham, where Barney betrays those who have helped them and finally goes too far.  The family comes perilously close to tragedy before Maria finds hope in the most unlikely place...

My Rating 5/5 Easy Read (Fiction)

I loved this book so much I just couldn’t put it down.

Shadows Of The Workhouse – Jennifer Worth

When Jennifer Worth became a midwife in the 1950’s, she joined an East End where many lives were touched by the shadow of the workhouse. For, although the institutions were officially abolished in 1930, in reality many did not close until several decades later.

In the follow-up of her bestselling Call The Midwife, Jennifer Worth tells the true stories of the people she met.  There’s Peggy and Frank, who were separated in the workhouse when their parents died – until Frank’s strength and determination enabled him to make a home for his sister.  Jane was a bright, lively child, whose spirit was broken by cruelty, until she found kindness and love later in life.  Then there is the matchmaking nun, Sister Julienne, and Sister Monica Joan, who ends up in the High Court...

My Rating 4/5 (Non-Fiction/Memoir)

I started to read this before Christmas and just couldn't get into it.
I started it again in January and reread from the start.
This time I was really into it and was glad I gave it another go.

The Power Of Dreams – Rosie Harris

When all hope is gone, are dreams enough...?

After losing both her parents, sixteen-year-old Merrion Roberts is left to bring up her baby sister. Unable to cope alone, she teams up with Rhonda Rees, a trained milliner, who also has a young baby. They share rooms in notorious Tiger Bay in Cardiff, struggling to make ends meet. In time, though, they are able to open up a little shop and it seems as if life is looking up for both young women.

But fate soon intervenes and they are reduced to living in even greater squalor, barely able to eke out enough money to support themselves let alone their two children. Meanwhile, Merrion’s brother and her childhood sweetheart have both gone to sea and she has almost given up hope of ever seeing them alive again...

My Rating 4/5 Liked This Book (Fiction)