Having totally enjoyed Ruth’s first two books i had fairly high expectations of this, and i wasn’t disappointed.
Once more Ruth dives into sensitive topics and tells a great story with not only compassion but also a wonderful touch of humour in all the right places.
Written from the point of view of Tilly and Tilda. Tilly, the little girl who finds out her dad just died after he went away to work and Tilda, the grown woman whose mum just died and left Tilda her diaries of what really happened to her dad all those years ago — and a simple note saying “Forgive me”. Back and forth we go, a chapter at a time, between Tilly back then and Tilda now, and it works amazingly well as, piece by piece, Tilly’s story gets told and Tilda’s truth gets revealed.
And what a wonderful place the Paradise Hotel must have been for a child to live, if only for a while. A delightful den of loveable, eccentric crackpots: “Everyone there had been cracked in the kiln in one way or another.”
Ruth is a wonderful writer who never fails to conjure up the most wonderful cast of characters to tell the stories about the damaged souls that life creates. I do hope for many more books from Ruth.
