Published by Shere 2012
ISBN 978-0-7515-4454-1
464 pages
Grade: 2/5
Will I read by this author: probably not, I found this book on my shelf next to ‘The Bookshop on the Corner’ which I thought was good enough to read one more by this author.
GENRE: romance
Keywords: family, history, true love, village life, sweets and candy, social norms of the time of 2WW, liquorish,
In this story we hear Lilian’s life history, the loss of her true love, Henry, an idiot who made another girl pregnant so he had to marry her, then he went off to the war (2WW) and got killed. Lilian is a very strong personality who has run the family candy store in small village, but at the age of 85 years has fallen and broken her leg and has problems to manage.
Rosie is an auxiliary nurse, with a lot of experience in handling patients in the emergency rooms and wards through an agency. For 6 years she has lived a boyfriend, the pharmacist who behaves like a small child, he had been living with his mother until they moved in together. They have not married because he is comfortable with the status quo. Lilian is Rosie’s mother’s, Angie’s, aunt. Angie has moved to Australia to help her son and she asks Rosie to help Lilian get into an old-people’s home and sell her candy shop. Rosie is reluctant because all her friends, work and boy friend are all in London.
Rosie finds that Lilian is an independent strong character and does not want help from anybody. But Rosie understands this and starts to take care of Lilian, feeding her, getting her to sleep in her bed. Cleans up the store although the local dentist is very much against having a candy shop on main street. She is introduced to the village through the local clinic where she helps the younger doctor to treat a severely wounded dog, the vet is busy in the other side of the county. The doctor takes her on rounds of home visits to the sick, to get to know the district. In the end he gets her to a young patient with a bad leg wound, he refuses all treatment and involvement from the doctor, but Rosie in her no-nonsense -way gets him the help he needs.
Lilian has written a book on how to prepare sweets, throughout the book the recipes are given; I am not a fan, I did like what was written about liquorish, which I like.
My thought:
I liked Lilian.
A quote: Lilian hated the idea of friendship being traded as a commodity, and could neither forgive nor forget (p 37).
Rosie as a nurse I liked, no-nonsense, but her private life is a mess and she does not realize it until her boyfriend comes to see her in the village and she breaks up with him.
She does find herself and becomes happy and finds stability with staying in the village and working in the candy shop; and of course, she even finds a new boyfriend.
I live in a small village and can recognize much of living where everybody knows who you are, what you do; that is quite well describes in the book.
The book is too long, it could have been edited to at least half the pages without missing the essentials.
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