Book Synopsis:
1946: The war might be over but for the Gilby family there are still battles to be fought at home . . .
For Birmingham and the Gilby family the war years have been a time of great change. With her husband having left her for another woman, Ann Gilby is finally free to follow her heart. While the neighbours may be scandalized by having a divorcee in their midst, Ann is determined to rise above the local gossip and make a happy home with her former sweetheart, the father of Ann’s youngest child.
Meanwhile daughters Joy and Sheila are lucky enough to have their menfolk back home, but Joy’s husband has returned from his experiences in a Japanese prisoner of war camp a broken man.
Then there’s Ann’s son, Martin, who is still coming to terms with learning who his real father is, as well as having secrets of his own . . .
From Annie Murray, the bestselling author of Chocolate Girls, Homecoming for the Chocolate Girls is the heartfelt and dramatic conclusion to this gritty family saga series about love, war and chocolate . . .
My Review:
Homecoming For The Chocolate Girls is another fantastic addition to one of my favourite saga series.
Firstly I loved being back with the fabulous characters who I’ve grown very fond of over the course of this series and who have started to feel like old friends. It was great to be able to follow them past the end of the war and to be able to see what happens next for them. I found it quite emotional though to see how changed the returning men where and how little help they got.
The author has obviously done a lot of research and I loved all the little historical details she included in the story. I live about an hour away from Cadbury World so knew a little bit of the history of Cadbury but it was fascinating to learn more about what it was like to work there. I was pleased to learn it was considered one of the better employers who looked after not just their workers but their family too. Throughout the book the reader learns more about societies view on divorce, sexuality and mental health which I found very interesting though it was quite poignant to see how this view affected or restricted people. It made me very glad that we are a more tolerant society now.
Overall I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading another installment soon. There was always something happening to keep me reading and I quickly found the book hard to put down as I wanted to make sure everything ended well for the characters. I think this might be the last book in the series which I’m sad about as I’m not ready to leave the lovely characters behind.
Huge thanks to the lovely Chloe from Pan Macmillan for inviting me onto the blog tour and for my copy of this book.
About The Author:
Annie Murray was born in Berkshire and read English at St John’s College, Oxford. Her first ‘Birmingham’ novel, Birmingham Rose, hit The Times bestseller list when it was published in 1995. She has subsequently written many other successful novels, including The Bells of Bournville Green, sequel to the bestselling Chocolate Girls, Sisters of Gold and Black Country Orphan. Annie has four children and lives just south of Oxford. She also writes as Abi Oliver.
Over The Rainbow Blog 