Lily: A Tale of Revenge from the Sunday Times bestselling author

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Ahogy ez a kislány sorba veszíti el a kötődéseit sokkal fájdalmasabb, mint a testi fenyítés, vagy fizikai munka. Surrounded by the beautiful landscape of rural Suffolk, and with a family and animals that she loved, Lily was really happy. The secretarial college education she is told to pursue after failing in school (despite being astute, incisive and witty) does not excite her; nor do her fleeting sexual encounters in London’s swinging sixties.

It’s an emotional read, for sure, and indeed I was moved on occasion by the harshness with which Lily is treated, but perhaps the cruelty is taken just one step too far. The pace of the writing is well set; it’s only a short novel, under 200 pages so character development and descriptions are quickly and effectively established.

After suffering years of brutal hardship at the Hospital, Lily is released into the world of Victorian London. The enthralling heroine of Tremain’s 16th novel is orphan Lily Mortimer, abandoned as a baby in 1850 at the gates of a park. Nem a köztük lévő húsz évre gondolok, hanem a vállalhatatlanságra, és arra, hogy ez a kötődés sokkal inkább egy az önmaga hősiességét megerősítő felnőtt, és a biztonságot kereső gyermek közt épül ki. You will laugh alongside her like a friend or sister, not quite laughing with her as there isn’t a lot of laughing when the serious business of teenage love is at hand.

This is the best kind of book, one that makes me read compulsively, pulling out my kindle at every opportunity, rooting for Marianne and longing for her to recognise her own worthiness and value. The countryside is very picturesque and well-written, although the prose is structured quite strangely. Her only friend, meanwhile – a child of just eight – is driven to such despair that when Lily knits her a scarf, she uses it to hang herself.A tale of unrequited love and so much more set amidst the harsh rigid expectations of middle class 1950/60s British society. After what must feel like a lifetime of harshness and suffering she goes to work at Belle Prettywood’s Wig Emporium. Marianne Clifford, teenage daughter of a peppery army colonel and his vain wife, falls helplessly and absolutely for eighteen-year-old Simon Hurst, whose cleverness and physical beauty suggest that he will go forward into a successful and monied future, helped on by doting parents.

As a reader you can see that she is perceptive and intelligent, but she doesn’t realise this, and in fact these qualities are recognised by only a few people in her life. Abandoned at the gates of a London park one winter's night in 1850, baby Lily Mortimer is saved by a young police constable and taken to the London Foundling Hospital. As it transpires, wickedness and degeneracy is the province of others, particularly one especially monstrous character.Simon plans to go to University and Marianne to remain his girlfriend evaporate, when his life unravels because of failed exams. Tremain relies on clumsy internal dialogue in an attempt to develop the character of Lily—there's a lot of "She wanted to say. This small but mighty novella is a master class in character and world building and the writing is just sublime. Overall, if you like well written historical fiction, with a good plot that you can immerse yourself in then this may just fit the bill. Tökéletesen mutatja be az egykori Londont, a kis lelencet, aki nagyon szimpatikus, szerethető karakter.

She’s very intriguing though you veer from wanting to shake her and tell her to embrace the life she has to the fullest, to feeling sorry for her as she’s frequently “put down” and has much to bear including tragedy.Not everyone who works in such places, however, is as good-hearted as their founders, and harsh punishment and cruelty, then as now, were not uncommon. L'écriture évocatrice nous transporte en un rien de temps dans les rues de Londres à l'époque victorienne où se côtoient violence et misère, mais aussi dans les belles campagnes anglaises, seul refuge pour notre héroïne dickensienne, seul rempart contre un destin funeste auquel elle tente d'échapper. However, I feel added to the story as it unravelled slowly and served an important purpose in strengthening the connection between the past and present, as well as building empathy for the protagonist as we see her childhood.