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Hazel Gaynor

Forfatter af The Girl Who Came Home

14+ Works 3,278 Members 337 Reviews 4 Favorited

Om forfatteren

Hazel Gaynor's debut novel, The Girl Who Came Home: A Novel of the Titanic, was a New York Times and USA Today bestseller. A Memory of Violets is her second novel. In addition to historical fiction, she writes a popular guest blog, Carry on Writing, for national Irish writing website writing.ie. vis mere She shares thoughts and experiences of the writing process and has interviewed a number of popular authors, including; Philippa Gregory, Sebastian Faulks, John Boyne and Cheryl Strayed. Hazel received the 2012 Cecil Day Lewis award for Emerging Writers and was selected by Library Journal as one of Ten Big Breakout Authors for 2015. (Bowker Author Biography) vis mindre

Omfatter også følgende navne: Hazel Gaynor, by Hazel Gaynor

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Værker af Hazel Gaynor

The Girl Who Came Home (2014) 656 eksemplarer
A Memory of Violets (2015) 472 eksemplarer
The Lighthouse Keeper's Daughter (2018) 416 eksemplarer
Last Christmas in Paris (2017) 392 eksemplarer
The Cottingley Secret (2017) 390 eksemplarer
When We Were Young & Brave (2020) 258 eksemplarer
Meet Me in Monaco (2019) 257 eksemplarer
The Girl from the Savoy (2016) 227 eksemplarer
Three Words for Goodbye (2021) 123 eksemplarer
The Last Lifeboat (2023) 79 eksemplarer
Hush (2016) 4 eksemplarer

Associated Works

Fall of Poppies: Stories of Love and the Great War (2016) — Bidragyder — 148 eksemplarer

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Almen Viden

Fødselsdato
20th century
Køn
female
Nationalitet
UK
Fødested
Yorkshire, England, UK
Bopæl
Ireland
Priser og hædersbevisninger
Cecil Day Lewis Award for Emerging Writers
Kort biografi
Hazel Gaynor is an award-winning New York Times, USA Today and international bestselling author. Her 2014 debut THE GIRL WHO CAME HOME won the 2015 RNA Historical Novel of the Year award, A MEMORY OF VIOLETS was a 2015 WHSmith Fresh Talent pick, THE GIRL FROM THE SAVOY was shortlisted for the 2017 Irish Book Awards, and THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPER'S DAUGHTER was shortlisted for the 2019 HWA Gold Crown Award. LAST CHRISTMAS IN PARIS (co-written with Heather Webb) won the 2018 Women's Fiction Writers Association Star Award. Their most recent collaboration is MEET ME IN MONACO. Hazel's forthcoming historical novel, WE WILL BE BRAVE, set in China during WW2, will be published in North America in October 2020.

Hazel was selected by Library Journal as one of Ten Big Breakout Authors for 2015. Her work has been translated into fourteen languages to date. She is co-founder of creative writing events The Inspiration Project, and lives in Ireland with her husband and two children. She is represented by Michelle Brower of Aevitas Creative Management, New York.

For more information, visit www.hazelgaynor.com

Medlemmer

Anmeldelser

3.5 stars

Unmarried and pregnant, Matilda is 19-years old in 1938 when she is sent across the ocean to live with a distant relative in Rhode Island, Harriet, who watches the lighthouse there.

One hundred years earlier, in England, a storm washed up survivors of a shipwreck, including Sarah. Sarah’s two young children died in the wreck. Grace Darling is the lighthouse keeper’s daughter who saw the survivors still in the water, so she and her dad went to help them. Grace become a local hero after this. (And apparently, Grace Darling was a real person.)

Matilda has a book on keeping lighthouses that she brings with her. The inscription includes one from Grace to Sarah and Sarah to (a different) Matilda.

I listened to the audio and it was good. I did lose focus at times, but I think I caught the main happenings in the book. Harriet also kept secrets and it took time for her to open up to Matilda. I liked her, though she did seem “gruff” at times. I liked all the characters, really. The women were pretty tough and self-sufficient – or certainly tried/wanted to be as much as they could in their time periods. There were a lot of characters, though, and there were times that it took me a bit to figure out which time frame and character’s POV I was listening to. It did say when the POV changed, but since I know my mind wandered some plus putting away the audio and picking it up later sometimes made it a bit tricky.
… (mere)
½
 
Markeret
LibraryCin | 37 andre anmeldelser | Feb 10, 2024 |
** spoiler alert ** *** But I can't comment on why I've rated it as I have without revealing a fair bit of the plot. ****

I read about the Cottingley fairies years ago, so was interested to read this fictional treatment. However, it was nearly a DNF at about two thirds. I put it aside but finally returned to it a couple of days ago. Luckily, the story picked up in the last part.

The narrative consists of two timelines: one set in present day Ireland, where Olivia has returned following the death of her beloved grandfather - she was raised by her grandparents - and the first person journal of Frances Griffiths, one of the girls in the Cottingley fairies story. Olivia is running away from marriage to a wealthy and hard-nosed businessman and has also not broken devastating news to him about her inability to have children. She has inherited a struggling bookshop from her granddad and sets about trying to get it on a better footing while dealing with the grief of her grandmother developing dementia and now in a nursing home.

Olivia finds Frances' personal account and begins to read it, plus a photograph of Frances with the fairies and a magazine article which gives Frances and her cousin Elsie aliases. Instead of realising their names were changed to fend off thrill-seekers, she persists for quite a while in a misconception that they are different people. That was a minor irritation though, compared to her general wimpish character. Instead of phoning the wedding planner to tell them the wedding is off, she throws her phone into the harbour! She behaves as if she 'has' to marry a man she now realises she doesn't love: something that would only be an issue in an historical novel where women had no choices. The treatment of her medical issue is also unconvincing: she should be experiencing an early menopause but has none of the symptoms.

The historical narrative was more interesting. Frances arrives in Yorkshire with her mother in 1917, having been raised in South Africa. Her father has gone off to fight in France. They live in Cottingley with an aunt, uncle and cousin Elsie. Although Frances is nine and her cousin about six years older, they get on really well. Frances spends a lot of time at the nearby beck (stream) and woodland, sometimes on her own as her cousin is working in a photography shop, and catches glimpses of colourful entities: the fairies.

One day when scolded by her mother for getting her dress wet wading in the beck, she blurts out that she sees fairies. Elsie, in whom she has already confided, comes up an idea of how to exonerate her: they will fake photographs. Being a reasonable artist, Elsie produces two sets of fairies, and they take the first two iconic photos which eventually end up being made public through the actions of her aunt and the interest of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the Theosophist Society. Outside interest gathers momentum over the next few years and they stage a couple more. Then Frances' father returns safely at the end of the war, and her family moves away. She thinks the fairy episode is over, apart from her guilty twinges about lying, but is drawn back to Cottingley in the early 1920s by outside pressure to take more photos.

Her narrative is more interesting than Olivia's, based on the historical account, though with some fictional elements, such as the schoolteacher with a missing child who provides the connection to Olivia's family. It's odd though that Olivia reads it at the same pace as its narrative placement in the novel and doesn't finish it until near the end, as the reader does. That comes across as unrealistic: why wouldn't she read it in a few days given the increasingly obvious connection to her own family?

The main issue with the older timeline were occasional jarring anachronisms: I'm pretty sure that 'teenager' wasn't coined till the 1950s, and surely the expression 'elephant in the room ' is quite modern? There were also a few Americanisms in the other part of the story such as 'gotten'. But these are insignificant compared to the annoying character of Olivia. Luckily she does become a bit more assertive in the last third and the book doesn't take the obvious happy ending.

There's a short section at the back which explains some of the history, how the author came to write the book, and includes the fairy photos. Since the last third of the story was better, and the non-fiction section was interesting, I've rated the book as 2 stars overall rather than the DNF it was originally headed towards.
… (mere)
 
Markeret
kitsune_reader | 43 andre anmeldelser | Jan 18, 2024 |
"Like the storms and the seasons, nothing stays the same forever."
1938. Newport, Rhode Island. Matilda Sarah Emmerson, 19, travels from Cobh, Ireland, to New York with a chaperone, a disgrace to her family, especially to her father, who has political aspirations. From New York, Matilda will travel to Newport, Rhode Island, to spend the remainder of her confinement with Harriet Flaherty, a relative responsible for the Rose Island Lighthouse.

1838. Farne Islands, off the coast of Northumberland, England. William Darling is Longstone Lighthouse’s lighthouse keeper, but it is his daughter Grace Horsley Darling who alerted her father that she saw a shipwreck and survivors in a storm still raging. Grace never wavered from the insistence that the individuals must be rescued.

After reading "A Memory of Violets," I knew I wanted to read not only more of the author's writing, but I look forward to reading every novel she writes, past and future. The books are beautifully written, not omitting heart-wrenching events or emotions but thoughtful, respectful, and inspirational.

The weave of dual timelines with multiple POVs is skillfully accomplished to render meaningful and seamless storytelling. The author's storytelling opens doors to the past and nurtures the reader to imagine what it was like to live and work with that period's societal and cultural restrictions. The quality of storytelling also opens windows for appreciation of the accomplishments of the women who came before us, casting aside the shadows that have kept their achievements and successes hidden.

I encourage all readers to read the Author's Note and Creation of a Heroine, sharing a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the author's idea to write about Grace Darling, blending creativity and historical research, becoming a fascinating historical glimpse of this inspirational young woman. At that point, I needed to return to reread the Epigraph page with quotes from Louisa May Alcott and Edith Wharton and turned back again to the Dedication, “For courageous women everywhere. You know who you are.”

Reading Group Discussion Questions are available at the end of the novel.

Reviewer’s Note: Longstone Lighthouse remains in use and is now monitored remotely from the Trinity House Centre at Harwich, Essex, England.
… (mere)
 
Markeret
FerneMysteryReader | 37 andre anmeldelser | Jan 18, 2024 |
Tom rereads the letters written by Evie and him during WWI while he was away fighting. These letters tell the story of their lives during the war.

I enjoyed this book. I liked that Evie saved her letters as did the people she wrote to during the war. Tom also saved his. I liked the insight given by Tom into the war and his breakdown. I do think the letters would have been more censored especially about the war front. I would like to know what happened between Tom and his cousin John that colored Tom's feelings towards John. I would also like to know why John was not on the battle front instead of at a desk job during the war.

I was thinking of how WWI changed so much for society with the breakdown of norms. I am sure they talked of before the war and after the war as we do the pandemic. Watching how their feelings toward the war changes during the 5 years of the war was interesting. At first, it's a lark then reality sets in that it will not be a quick war and people have changed because of what they saw and did. Plus, there were some that never came home. I was glad Evie defied her mother over her brother's letters. It helped at the end to know that Tom was not alone in Paris for his last Christmas.

While I was fine during most of the book, the ending killed me. I cried hard over those last few pages so you might want to keep kleenex at hand. I am crying now as I write this, remembering the ending. This is a book worth reading. If I had not borrowed it from the library, I would be putting it on my keeper shelf.
… (mere)
 
Markeret
Sheila1957 | 34 andre anmeldelser | Dec 12, 2023 |

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Værker
14
Also by
2
Medlemmer
3,278
Popularitet
#7,810
Vurdering
3.9
Anmeldelser
337
ISBN
138
Sprog
4
Udvalgt
4

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