The Girl from Paradise Alley by Sandy Taylor

☆☆☆☆
Kindle Edition, 348 pages
Expected publication: February 5th 2020 by Bookouture
About the Book:
Ireland, 1924. For thirteen-year-old Nora Doyle every day is a fight for survival. In the rural Irish village she calls home, she is no stranger to funerals or feeling the cold wind blowing through the windows of the small cottage where she lives with her family. Somehow Nora manages to keep smiling, but she longs to escape the poverty surrounding her. One day, Nora’s life changes when her sense of adventure leads her and her best friend, Kitty, through a hole in the wall of the huge house on the top of the hill. In the secluded, carefully tended garden they discover on the other side, Nora and Kitty meet Edward, the young boy who lives there, and they instantly form a strong bond. Soon Nora is spending every moment she can spare in the secret garden. But in escaping from her life in the village, Nora is going against the wishes of her family, who have forbidden any contact with the big house. Because Edward holds the key to a family secret that will change Nora’s life forever, and force her to make an impossible choice between her family and her future.

Sandy Taylor is one of those authors whose books I eagerly wait for and pick up without even reading the blurb - she always delivers. With this book she has raised the bar already set so very high with her previous stunning stories. This story is exquisite perfection. Well crafted, beautifully written, emotional, poignant and immersive. I lived every word. The sense of time and place is, as with all her books, just perfect. All the characters come alive on the page. I felt for both Nora and Eddie and their circumstances.

I felt that this book was hopeful enough, while still telling the sad, realistic stories that accompany this period in time. I enjoyed the characters and thinking about how different scenarios were taking place with the children of similar ages but different classes. How they experienced similar things, but with their own personal elements. I was enthralled with the story all the way to the end and stayed up too late reading, but it was worth it. A wonderful story, masterfully written. Very highly recommended to everyone.

Thank you NetGalley, Sandy Taylor and Bookouture for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an impartial review; all opinions are my own.

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