An Orphan's Song (Shilling Grange Children's Home #3) by Lizzie Page
Genre: Historical fiction, Sagas
Read: 10th July 2022
Published: 13th July 2022
★★★★ 4.5 stars
DESCRIPTION:
England, 1951. A tear-jerking and uplifting story about children orphaned by war, the grieving young woman who cares for them, and their journey together to healing.
When Clara Newton’s American pilot fiancé died during the war, she thought she might never heal. But now she has a new life looking after orphans in a children’s home named in his memory. Like wide-eyed, musical little Rita, who refuses to believe her mother died during the Blitz. With the Festival of Britain approaching, Clara is delighted to see the children singing and preparing to audition together. And with D-Day war hero and handyman Ivor living next door, she begins to open her heart once more.
But when a deeply troubled orphan arrives on Clara’s doorstep, she faces her greatest challenge yet. Clifford has arrived without a background file and while Clara struggles to meet his needs, she is desperately in need of help. Turning to Ivor for comfort, she is broken-hearted when he decides he may never be ready for love again, as he adjusts to life as a single father.
Clara has never failed to help any of the orphans in her care. And when little Rita encourages Clifford to join their singing group, she hopes he may begin to find his way. But soon he endangers not only their beloved plans for the Festival of Britain but the lives of the other children…
When disaster strikes, can Clara save the orphans and make Rita’s dreams of singing for Britain come true? And while Ivor cares for his baby alone, can Clara have a future with the man she loves?
A totally uplifting and emotional tear-jerker set after World War Two. Fans of Before We Were Yours, Diney Costeloe and The Orphan Sisters will be reaching for the tissues and reading all through the night.
MY THOUGHTS:
I am excited to be taking part in the #BooksOnTour #BlogTour for Lizzie Page's delightful tale AN ORPHAN'S SONG.
Following on from "The Orphanage" and "A Place to Call Home", AN ORPHAN'S SONG is the third in this charming series and takes readers back to Shilling Grange Orphanage, now renamed The Michael Adams Children's Home. Although it can be read as a standalone sufficely, the story works much better when read alongside the previous two.
Clara Newton came to Lavenham, Suffolk just after the end of the war having suffered her own heartbreak in the loss of her fiance, American airman, Michael and whom the home is now named in honour of. Now it is 1951 and Clara has been with the home for some years now and the job she had once shied away from as soon as walking into it, she now embraces with open arms along with the children who reside there in her care. We rejoin the children including Maureen, Rita and Peg as well as villagers in Anita, Dr Cardew, Mr Dowsett, Mrs Horton (nee Bridges), Julian. And of course, Ivor.
Over the years, Clara has seen several come and gone - Terry, twins Billy and Barry, Joyce, Evelyn, Alex and Peter - and has had a few new ones deposited on her doorstep with little to no warning. This time, we meet three new children who make their home at Shilling Grange. Clifford is the first to arrive, with no file so she is unaware of what to expect from the young man...but after just a day or two it is clear that he is precocious and challenging and Clara, who is not one to give up, it at her wits end with how to deal with him. Particularly with no information to help her understand the boy better. Then another new child, Denny, arrives with his own set of challenges and buckets of tears at his predicament. But Clara is more than capable of caring for the children in her care and proves herself more than worthy in this regard...despite her own lack of self-worth or confidence.
But Clara has plenty to keep herself occupied, particularly when a fire breaks out in the barn behind the home one night, threatening to burn Rita's beloved music and piano. The thought of it being so close to the house raises come concern as well as who could be responsible for it. And when another fire breaks out close by, Clara is approached by a "concerned citizen" who had apparently witnessed the culprit and it is then she knows she must do something.
During the last book, under the guidance of Anita Cardew, Rita found her niche in playing the piano despite not being able to read music. Anita was in awe of Rita's natural talent and decided to audition her for the Festival of Britain. Then what began as Rita's performance ended up being something all the children became involved in as they all played a part - singing, dancing, even playing the drums, surprisingly in Peg's case. But they first had to get through the audition afterwhich would come a performance at the Hippodrome in Ipswich. If they were successful they would then go on to London to perform at the Royal Festival Hall. Clara found it difficult to see what all the fuss was about in a country striving to recover from a war that just about decimated them. But the children were stoic and worked hard to achieve their dream of performing...where ever that may be.
As delightful as the series is, the one thing that has irritated me from the beginning is the "will they/won't they" dance between Clara and Ivor. Just when it seemed they were finally getting over themselves and getting their acts together, both of them then went and read things entirely wrong, assumed something completely different and failed to actually talk to each other. This theme has continued over the entirety of the three books and I just wanted to bash their heads together. I didn't appreciate the tantalising the author may have been trying to accomplish here because all it did was annoy me that Clara saw something and imagined something else and assumed it to be true without talking to Ivor. And Ivor? He just did the whole silent male thing and refused to talk at all, instead either escaping to goodness knows where for the most part of book 2 to holing himself up in his workshop out of Clara's way...again, not talking things over with her. I'm not going to say where things may have or haven't ended up with these two this time round but I do wonder what will happen should there be a book 4? For me, this aspect did drop the rating slightly because it was just such an annoying part of the story. They are adults for goodness sake and should behave like adults.
The children are as endearing ever, each with their own little quirks and foibles. Rita, now 11, is still calling "Mama" at certain opportunities despite her being told she was killed in the Blitz (which would have made Rita only 1 at the time...hmmm). Peg still doesn't speak but she is still absolutely adorable. I keep expecting her to surprise everyone and start chattering. But she has uttered nothing since that one and only time of warning "Cows!" in the first book. Maureen is still moody but then she is a teenager. I was most surprised by Peter considering how close to Clara he was. And their last addition was Gladys who tells absolutely everyone that she loves them. There's a definite story there which I feel could be told in a fourth book. I hope the series doesn't end here (as I've seen someone mention it was a trilogy) as what was the point of introducing Gladys at all in that case?
AN ORPHAN'S SONG is a delightfully heartwarming tale that will charm fans of stories of this nature and authors such as Shirley Dickson, Glynis Peters, Lindsey Hutchinson and Diney Costeloe.
I would like to thank #LizziePage, #NetGalley and #Bookouture for an ARC of #AnOrphansSong in exchange for an honest review.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
Sam was born in February 1971, in Essex, England. After studying politics at Warwick University, she worked as an English teacher in Paris and then for five years, in Tokyo. She then went to live in London, and had various uninspiring jobs there.
Sam did an MA in creative writing at Goldsmiths and returned to live in Essex a few years ago and have worked in marketing, teaching, assisting, etc ever since.
She loves reading ALL the books, and always loved reading the adventures of women in the past so it seemed natural to her to write historical fiction.
She claims her partner Steve, three children and cockapoo all conspire to stop her writing.
Sam lives with her family and dog by the sea in South East England.She enjoys traveling and she's had lots of different jobs from waitressing and teaching to admin and bingo-calling - but being a writer is her absolute favourite.
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