The Return: The 'captivating and deeply moving' Number One bestseller

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Formerly a travel writer, Hislop has certainly smartened up the genre. “A beach book with heart,” claimed the Observer of The Island, which is currently being filmed as a 25-part serial for Greek television, but with the addition of some steamy sex scenes which aren’t actually in the book. Both The Island and The Return tell of the uncovering of old family secrets. The first is a multi-generational narrative set in a former leprosy colony on Spinalonga, a Greek island off Crete, which Hislop and her family discovered when they were holidaying there. Her husband hates sitting on a beach, preferring to explore new places. The Return takes place in Granada and revisits the bloody conflict of the Spanish Civil War, which tore the country, and many loving families, apart.

The tale is narrated by Maria, one of the children in Hislop’s novel The Island, from which this engrossing yarn is skillfully adapted for younger readers.Beautifully imagined, well-researched and evocatively told, Victoria Hislop’s The Island recreates a leper colony of the 1930s and follows its inmates and neighbors on the Island of Crete through the Second World War to the present day. The theme of searching for identity is well-served as the author follows characters whose identities have been stolen by disease—some losing their physical self-image, others half-destroyed mentally by loss of family and friends. The agony of ostracism, the fear of ever-present death and the struggle to create a life where life is already failing are made chillingly real. The kindness and cruelty of strangers threads the tale. And the modern-day story of a young woman searching for her own identity, seeking her past and her future, makes a pleasing wrapper.

A warm, lively conversationalist, she is no stranger to long-buried secrets herself and it’s tempting to play the amateur psychologist and suggest that this is why she writes so well about such matters since they echo her own past. The history of the novel was interesting, but it really dragged on and on in the last quarter of the book as there was no climactic scene like in The Island. On the face of it, the novel was fine but there were just too many problems with it for me to give it more than two stars. For a start all the characters were either good or bad, selfish or selfless. The poor were wonderful people with tonnes of friends and the rich only cared about money and were ultimately miserable and alone. I realise the Moreno family was an exception to this, but they still chose to live in the poorest part of the city and were therefore wonderful.In 2020, Hislop was granted honorary Greek citizenship for promoting modern Greek history and culture. [9] The following year she was a contestant on Dancing with the Stars, the Greek version of Strictly Come Dancing. [10] Bibliography [ edit ] Novels [ edit ] Sara Cox's guests discuss the books that transport them to other countries. Between the Covers: Books that transport you That was on my mind while reading "The Thread"...Reminded me of my thoughts exactly when many years ago I was devouring "The Island"... Foster, Sophie (16 June 2019). "Victoria Hislop: 'Ian was in a different league to me at Oxford - he charged me 50p to borrow his essays' ". The Sunday Telegraph . Retrieved 18 June 2019.

For me, while I found very emotional the Jews storyline and their ending, I 'd prefer that Victoria Hislop would make us feel a little bit more of her characters' sentiments and not so much "tell" us their feelings... Like the heroine of The Return, Hislop originally went to Granada to learn to dance because she wanted to write a novel about dance; then, like Sonia, she stumbled across stories about the civil war. “I love music and I love to dance. I even dance in my kitchen when I’m cooking. She also worked in public relations and as a journalist before eventually becoming a full-time novelist. Although Sonia Cameron is completely oblivious of the city’s dark past, a coincidental conversation and some fascinating old photos plunges her into the remarkable story of Spain during the civil war. Hislop's heroes are trying to survive - not always with success - through all these difficult times. Their lives get tangled up with each other's history and the author does a really good job in unfolding her characters during such an era.

These are memories she treasures because she’s always had a wonderful relationship with her mother, who is now in her eighties and lives close by in Tunbridge Wells. On the brink of a life-changing decision, Alexis Fielding longs to find out about her mother's past. But Sofia has never spoken of it. All she admits to is growing up in a small Cretan village before moving to London. When Alexis decides to visit Crete, however, Sofia gives her daughter a letter to take to an old friend, and promises that through her she will learn more. A dramatic and moving adaptation of Victoria’s bestselling novel "The Island" with rich, full-colour illustrations by Gill Smith that will transport the reader to the timeless and beautiful Greek landscape … No other family members went to Sonia’s funeral, only her parents. The tragic story haunted Hislop and when she finally discussed it with her mother she understood that trying to forget was how things were done 50 years ago. That’s what her parents attempted to do. “Now, I realise it must have been awful for them,” she says. The quest for Javier never sinks into sentimentality. Hislop avoids, too, the temptation of a chocolate-box ending. Less successful is Sonia's too-hurried assimilation of everything she has learned from Miguel, given that it leads her to change her life completely. Perhaps warmer memories of her mother are needed, a stronger sense of connection to both mother and father. Our parents' lives, before they had us, can seem like another country, and it requires a deep longing to reach out across the years in understanding to give the quest real meaning. As the novel ends, Sonia's voyage of discovery has maybe just begun.

But on the day of her departure for Athens, Ellie receives a notebook; one revealing about a man’s trip to Greece. Este terceiro livro que li de Victoria Hislop, a seguir aos livros da mesma autora,"A Ilha" e "O Regresso", fez-me "mergulhar" na história de Tessalonica e também da Grécia no decurso do século XX, entre 1917 (ano em que um incêndio destrói grande parte daquela cidade) e o terramoto do dia 20 de junho de 1978, que também afetou a mesma cidade, com as suas consequências devastadoras. Through dance she discovers a new lease of life. By chance, she also meets an elderly cafe proprietor, who recounts – in a riveting third-person narrative that makes up the best part of the novel – the story of the death of the great Spanish poet, Lorca, and of the Ramirez family. These educational resources carefully and sensitively explore curriculum-based themes such as prejudice, isolation, discrimination, and most importantly, hope.

Maria’s Island

She discovers how intimately she is connected with the island, and how secrecy holds them all in its powerful grip… Leprosy. You think of is as a biblical or medieval disease but I had not realised that even a control/cure wasn't found until the mid 20th century. This involving story is set on the island Spinalonga off the coast of Crete, between the two world wars, where there was a leper colony until leprosy was eradicated by medical intervention. Parts were a bit uncomfortable to read but overall I really enjoyed this book and would read more of her titles. Victoria Hislop is a born storyteller and her love and passion for Greece comes through loud and clear with every word she writes.” ★★★★★ reader review for THE FIGURINE.