Women in Love - Lonely Mirrors
By BrianRS, 22nd Jun 2012 | Follow this author
| RSS Feed | Short URL http://nut.bz/piofrgb6/
Posted in WikinutReviewsBooksRomance
Women in love is a classic romance novel that moves from the second world war to modern times as it examines the relationships between mothers and daughters. A father has an illicit affair in wartime Cairo that affects all of their lives. As the mothers grow older and the daughters find their own way in life all is revealed.
- A Romantic Love Story that Explores the Relationships between Mother and Daughter
- How Time Itself Can be Distorted
- Romantic Novelist - Susannah Carlton
A Romantic Love Story that Explores the Relationships between Mother and Daughter
Lonely Mirrors is the name of this debut romantic novel written by Susannah Carlton.
It is set primarily in Cairo Egypt, once a place affected by the second world war and where men and women from foreign countries gathered to play their parts in the fight against nazi Germany.
Jennifer Elmwood is a woman who's personal and professional life seems to be being torn apart. Now she receives a letter unexpectedly from Margaret Evans, a woman that lives in Cairo and who claims to have known her father during the second world war. Despite her problems she decides to go and visit Margaret in the Egyptian capital and discovers a long held secret.
Her meetings with Margaret continue and through these meetings the stories of four women unfold. Mothers and daughters their relationships and the affect that a father's illicit romance has on their lives.
A search for emotional security begins, an exploration of the relationships between mothers and daughters. Pearl and Violetta are the mothers of Jennifer and Margaret and they also want the opportunity to tell their stories.
In much the same way as Cairo is a jumbled up mix of new and old, ancient and modern, also entwined together are the memories of these four women. Different generations and different times but experiences that reveal their sexual awakenings, the affect of deaths on their families, their childhoods and the relationships they have with their husbands. The book takes you from the valleys of Wales to London, Cairo and France over a period of seventy years dating back to World War II.
How Time Itself Can be Distorted
A year ago can seem more recent than yesterday for a woman in emotional chaos. Even events that occurred decades ago can hold more importance than events from a week ago. Time scales expand and contract in this story. Jennifer feels like the five years of a recently finished affair are more like a few brief weeks and for Margaret a relationship that lasted only a couple of years seven decades ago is always at the forefront of her mind. Real time is no longer real and total turmoil is inevitable.
Each of the four women have a tale to tell, incidents in their lives bring a distorted image of the lives of the others. Jennifer has never been happy, she was large child and got married too young just so she could get away from her mother. Pearl was the epitome of a spoilt child and has never worked. Margaret was an army nurse and has witnessed first hand the vulnerabilities of people caught up in war. And finally there is Violetta, taken from her home country to Wales by Sicilian parents and who was pregnant by the time she was seventeen years old.
Jennifer's visit to Cairo was brief but was enough to foster an intense relationship between the two women, more like mother and daughter than the strangers they were when they first met. The tales spin through time and place, they involve friendships, trust, deceit and possibly a degree of reconciliation. These are all women who have experienced deaths, separation and betrayal in their lives, and all these aspects are scrutinised in the greatest of detail.
Romantic Novelist - Susannah Carlton
Susannah has a long standing love affair with writing, after starting her career as a teacher and working both in the United Kingdom and Sweden she changed course and spent a period writing professionally as a journalist. She has had plays produced for television radio and the theatre and now her writing passion has moved onto romantic novels. Romantic novels with a bite, it has to be said.
She did move away from journalism eventually to work as a counsellor specialising in domestic violence. Now she spends her time living in her home in Somerset, England and her apartment in Paris, France. She believes she has had a privileged life and she now draws upon her life's experiences to fuel her writing.
Comments