My rating 4.5 stars
The story is set in Cyprus and follows two different perspectives. The first is from Petra, a widowed optician, and the second from Yiannis, who forages for wild herbs and mushrooms by day and at night he is an illegal poacher of Songbirds. Petra and Yiannis live very different lives, but they have one thing in common, and that is Nisha. Nisha moved to Cyprus from Sri Lanka nine years ago to work for Petra as a house maid and to help look after her daughter. While working for Petra, Nisha and Yiannis become close and end up dating. But just as everything is going well Nisha disappears and no one knows where she has gone. But both Petra and Yiannis are determined to find out what has happened to her.
Now, having loved The Beekeeper of Aleppo I couldn’t wait to get stuck into this one. But when I first started this Songbirds I honestly wasn’t too sure about it. I found it to be slow and was almost pushed to the edge of boredom, but as I really wanted to find out what had happened to Nisha I persevered and it was definitely worth it. At about halfway there was a shift in the pace and I really got invested in the storyline and raced through the second half.
Songbirds is very different to The Beekeeper of Aleppo, it’s not as dark, but still very powerful and haunting read at times. This is definitely a book that I will think about for a long time to come. Even after the slow start, this turned out to be a great read and would definitely recommend picking it up!!
The story is set in Cyprus and follows two different perspectives. The first is from Petra, a widowed optician, and the second from Yiannis, who forages for wild herbs and mushrooms by day and at night he is an illegal poacher of Songbirds. Petra and Yiannis live very different lives, but they have one thing in common, and that is Nisha. Nisha moved to Cyprus from Sri Lanka nine years ago to work for Petra as a house maid and to help look after her daughter. While working for Petra, Nisha and Yiannis become close and end up dating. But just as everything is going well Nisha disappears and no one knows where she has gone. But both Petra and Yiannis are determined to find out what has happened to her.
Now, having loved The Beekeeper of Aleppo I couldn’t wait to get stuck into this one. But when I first started this Songbirds I honestly wasn’t too sure about it. I found it to be slow and was almost pushed to the edge of boredom, but as I really wanted to find out what had happened to Nisha I persevered and it was definitely worth it. At about halfway there was a shift in the pace and I really got invested in the storyline and raced through the second half.
Songbirds is very different to The Beekeeper of Aleppo, it’s not as dark, but still very powerful and haunting read at times. This is definitely a book that I will think about for a long time to come. Even after the slow start, this turned out to be a great read and would definitely recommend picking it up!!