Silvertown: An East End Family Memoir Melanie McGrath review by Janet Page This is a no holds barred history of Melanie’s grandmother Jenny Page who was born in the East End and lived there through WW2. It doesn’t hold back on the detail of her hard life, working in the sweatshops and later in her … Read more
Crooked Heart Lisa Evans review by Amanda Masters This is the only book that has got a universal thumbs up from all the members or our small book group. Set in the war it tells the tale of the unlikely relationship between a young boy evacuee and the woman who takes him in for purely … Read more
London belongs to me Norman Collins review by Janet Page Set just prior to, and in the early days of, World War Two, this epic by contemporary writer Norman Collins delves into the lives of ordinary families living in an ordinary London street. We meet some amazing characters including faded former actress Connie, a self-styled … Read more
The Reader on the 6.27 Jean-Paul Didierlaurent review by Janet Page Bizarrely for a book whose main protagonist works in a book pulping factory, this is a book for lovers and lovers in general. The main character is a lonely man who finds companionship amongst the commuters on the 6.27 train he takes to work. … Read more
The Midnight Line Lee Child review by Avril Davies The latest in the Jack Reacher series hardly needs a review. The point I want to make is that the latest bestseller by British former journalist Lee Child (whose choice of pen name is also a story worth telling) is available from the library. Along with … Read more
East West Street Phillipe Sands review by Gareth Davies East West Street is the best book I read in 2018, and it’s on the shelves of the Beacon Villages Library in Ivinghoe. You might initially mistake it for a wartime thriller, with a Shakespearean twist. A mysterious woman from Norfolk travels to Vienna in the … Read more