Category: Reading Challenges

#BlogTour #BookReview The Stationmaster’s Daughter by Kathleen McGurl @HQDigitalUK

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The Stationmasters DaughterWelcome to one of today’s three stops on the blog tour for The Stationmaster’s Daughter by Kathleen McGurl, published by HQ Digital on 7th August 2019. It will be available in paperback on 17th October 2019 and is available for pre-order now.

My thanks to Rachel at Rachel’s Random Resources for the invitation to join the tour and to HQ Digital for my review copy provided via NetGalley.

The Stationmaster's DaughterAbout the Book

As the last train leaves, will life ever be the same?

Dorset 1935 – Stationmaster Ted has never cared much for romance. Occupied with ensuring England’s most beautiful railway runs on time, love has always felt like a comparatively trivial matter. Yet when he meets Annie Galbraith on the 8.42 train to Lynford, he can’t help but instantly fall for her. But soon the railway is forced to close and a terrible accident occurs within the station grounds, Ted finds his job and any hope of a relationship with Annie hanging in the balance…

Present day – Recovering from heartbreak after a disastrous marriage, Tilly decides to escape from the bustling capital and move to Dorset to stay with her dad, Ken. When Ken convinces Tilly to help with the restoration of the old railway, she discovers a diary hidden in the old ticket office. Tilly is soon swept up in Ted’s story, and the fateful accident that changed his life forever. But an encounter with an enigmatic stranger takes Tilly by surprise, and she can’t help but feel a connection with Ted’s story in the past.

Format: ebook (384 pp.)                     Publisher: HQ Digital
Publication date: 7th August 2019. Genre: Historical Fiction, Dual Time

Purchase Links*
Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com | Hive
*link provided for convenience, not as part of any affiliate programme

Find The Stationmaster’s Daughter on Goodreads

My Review

Despite being separated by over eighty years in time, Ted and Tilly are dealing with similar challenges.

Tilly is recovering from traumatic events in her personal life and the unexpected breakdown of her marriage to Ian. Both have brought her to the brink of despair. Thankfully her dear friend, Jo, and her lovely dad, Ken, are there to support her. Moving down to Dorset to stay with her father, Tilly initially rejects his wise advice and his attempts to encourage her to focus on the future. She turns to drink to soothe the anguish she feels until a chance encounter changes everything. Soon, Tilly finds her interest piqued by what she finds while working on the archives of the railway preservation society to which her father belongs.

Ted is a simple soul who has always found relationships with other people difficult and never imagined himself having a wife or family. That is until he meets Annie and a different life suddenly becomes a possibility. However, the announcement of the closure of the railway throws Ted’s life into turmoil. How will he cope with a change that threatens his job, home, routine and – most importantly – his relationship with Annie? The author really immerses the reader in Ted’s dilemma so you experience along with him each doubt and fear of this sweet, gentle man. Luckily, Ted has his sister Norah to provide a little reassurance and wise advice, although even she is unable to prevent the tragic events that will follow.

At the end of the book, the two storylines come together in a completely satisfying way. And when the full story of the dramatic event described in the prologue is finally revealed, there is sadness but also a new understanding and appreciation of the choices made by those involved.

The skilful writing and heartfelt, poignant story really drew me into the book. The Stationmaster’s Daughter will warm the cockles of your heart and quite possibly cause you to shed a tear or two.

In three words: Touching, tender, emotional

Try something similar: The Forgotten Secret by Kathleen McGurl

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The Stationmasters Kathleen McGurl author photoAbout the Author

Kathleen McGurl lives near the sea in Bournemouth, UK, with her husband and elderly tabby cat. She has two sons who are now grown-up and have left home. She began her writing career creating short stories, and sold dozens to women’s magazines in the UK and Australia. Then she got side-tracked onto family history research – which led eventually to writing novels with genealogy themes. She has always been fascinated by the past, and the ways in which the past can influence the present, and enjoys exploring these links in her novels.

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#BookReview Untitled: The Real Wallis Simpson by Anna Pasternak

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UntitledAbout the Book

Who was the real Wallis: an opportunistic American social climber, a master manipulator or the true love of Edward’s life? Amid the cacophony of condemnation her story has become obfuscated. Untitled is an intimate biography of one of the most misunderstood women in British royal history.

His charisma and glamour ensured him the status of a rock star prince. Yet Edward gave up the British throne, the British Empire and his position as Emperor of India, to marry his true love, American divorcee Wallis Simpson.

So much gossip and innuendo has been levelled at Wallis Simpson that it has become nearly impossible to discern the real woman. Many have wondered why, when Edward could have had anyone he desired, he was smitten with this unusual American woman. As her friend Herman Rogers said to her in 1936 when news of her affair with Edward broke: ‘Much of what is being said concerns a woman who does not exist and never did exist.’

History is mostly perceived from the perspective of his-story. But what about her story? Anna Pasternak’s new book is the first ever to give Wallis a chance and a voice to show that she was a warm, loyal, intelligent woman adored by her friends, who was written off by cunning, influential Establishment men seeking to diminish her and destroy her reputation. As the author argues, far from being the villain of the abdication, she was the victim.

Anna Pasternak is appearing at Henley Literary Festival 2019

Format: e-book (369 pp.)    Publisher: William Collins
Published: 7th March 2019   Genre: Biography, History, Nonfiction

Purchase Links*
Amazon.co.uk  ǀ Hive.co.uk (supporting UK bookshops)
*links provided for convenience, not as part of any affiliate programme

Find Untitled: The Real Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor on Goodreads

My Review

Anna Pasternak nails her colours pretty unashamedly to the mast when she talks about the book being fuelled by a desire to rehabilitate Wallis in history. Untitled paints the Duchess of Windsor in a positive light, putting forward her side of the story and attempting to quash some, if not all, of the accusations that have been levelled at her. The list of sources and references at the back of the book demonstrate the detailed research undertaken by the author.

I was surprised to learn of the extremes to which the government went in their opposition to the relationship between Edward and Wallis Simpson, including listening in to their private telephone conversations.

However, I was left with a picture of two people so wrapped up in each other that the impact of their actions on others ceased to matter or just simply did not occur to them. At times, the behaviour of Wallis and Edward was either naive or bordered on the crass and their lavish lifestyle was far removed from the experience of the majority of Edward’s subjects. However, no-one with any feelings would surely wish for them the sadness of their final years – declining health, exile and manipulation by others.

Untitled is also the story of a family torn apart by a decision regarded variously as an act of selfishness, betrayal and a failure of duty. The author depicts how the refusal by his mother, Queen Mary, to receive Wallis or even acknowledge her and the decision not to grant the Duchess HRH status became totemic issues for Edward, creating a rift in the Royal Family that was never repaired in his lifetime.

In the Afterword, the author observes that she found herself warming to Edward during the process of researching and writing the book. I’m afraid this reader had the opposite experience. If anything, Edward comes out diminished to my mind. His blind devotion to Wallis is touching but tainted by his seemingly single-minded belief that he should have whatever he wanted in life, regardless of the consequences. As the author observes, ‘His love for Wallis was as selfish and as crucial to his survival as a child’s; it would have been the more loving act to have relinquished her‘.

As for Wallis? I think the author sums it up when she comments, ‘She [Wallis] was powerful – in her effect on Edward – but powerless, in her inability to prevent events from spiralling out of control’.

I received a review copy courtesy of William Collins via NetGalley.

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In three words: Fascinating, detailed, intimate

Try something similar…Chanel’s Riviera: The Cote d’Azur in Peace and War, 1930 – 1944 by Anne de Courcy

About the Author

Anna Pasternak is an author, columnist and journalist. She writes regularly for Sunday Times Style, Conde Nast Traveller, Harper’s Bazaar, and others. She lives in Oxfordshire with her husband and daughter.