I knew I would love this after enjoying The Familiars so much. Stacey Halls writes in such a way that the characters and setting come to life in tangible, satisfying detail.
Set in London in 1754, the story follows Bess Bright, a working class girl forced to give up her day-old daughter at The Foundling hospital, a place where children are cared for until their parents can afford to come back for them. And Bess makes a promise to do just that. She leaves a token with baby Clara, goes back to work with her father selling the prawns he catches by the docks, and vows to return when she can support her.
Six years later Bess has scrimped and saved what she hopes is enough to welcome Clara back. But when she goes back to The Foundling, she is bewildered to hear the news that Clara isn’t there because she already got picked up… apparently by Bess herself, six years ago!
While Bess is shocked into action to find out what happened to her daughter, just a mile across town in a stuffy townhouse, lively little Charlotte Callard lives a sheltered life of reading French, running down the halls, chasing the long suffering cook and desperately wanting to play outside. Her quiet, reclusive mother Alexandra is still mourning the loss of her husband and is struggling to bring up her energetic daughter alone. So when her sympathetic friend Dr Mead from The Foundling hospital suggests a nursemaid for Charlotte, while Alexandra knows she needs help, she is wary of letting a stranger into her carefully curated life behind closed doors.
When Bess, in the guise of Eliza, enters the Callard household, both women find their lives turned upside down and their long-kept secrets threatening to spill out.
I particularly loved the characters of Bess’s plucky friend Kezia, and charming linkboy Lyle, as well as headstrong Bess herself.
Just like The Familiars, impeccable research has been undertaken to blend fact and fiction, painting an accurate picture of the inequalities of Georgian London with a compelling story of the complexities of motherhood, loss and love, from two very different but distinctly female perspectives.
Set in London in 1754, the story follows Bess Bright, a working class girl forced to give up her day-old daughter at The Foundling hospital, a place where children are cared for until their parents can afford to come back for them. And Bess makes a promise to do just that. She leaves a token with baby Clara, goes back to work with her father selling the prawns he catches by the docks, and vows to return when she can support her.
Six years later Bess has scrimped and saved what she hopes is enough to welcome Clara back. But when she goes back to The Foundling, she is bewildered to hear the news that Clara isn’t there because she already got picked up… apparently by Bess herself, six years ago!
While Bess is shocked into action to find out what happened to her daughter, just a mile across town in a stuffy townhouse, lively little Charlotte Callard lives a sheltered life of reading French, running down the halls, chasing the long suffering cook and desperately wanting to play outside. Her quiet, reclusive mother Alexandra is still mourning the loss of her husband and is struggling to bring up her energetic daughter alone. So when her sympathetic friend Dr Mead from The Foundling hospital suggests a nursemaid for Charlotte, while Alexandra knows she needs help, she is wary of letting a stranger into her carefully curated life behind closed doors.
When Bess, in the guise of Eliza, enters the Callard household, both women find their lives turned upside down and their long-kept secrets threatening to spill out.
I particularly loved the characters of Bess’s plucky friend Kezia, and charming linkboy Lyle, as well as headstrong Bess herself.
Just like The Familiars, impeccable research has been undertaken to blend fact and fiction, painting an accurate picture of the inequalities of Georgian London with a compelling story of the complexities of motherhood, loss and love, from two very different but distinctly female perspectives.