The Return is every bit as gripping as The Island, and is impossible to read without a box of Kleenex by your side. It tells of Sonia Cameron, who is unhappily married to a “dusty” husband, with a serious drink problem. Oblivious to the past, she travels to Moorish Granada, with a wild-child girlfriend, in search of escape and salsa lessons. Their father’s televisual fame used to embarrass the siblings dreadfully when they were younger, she says. “It’s a bit of a drag having a parent on the telly, I think. But Ian’s famous because people like watching him and Paul Merton – who’s become a real family friend – so we can’t really complain.” The army coup of 1936, under the command of Franco, however destroyed the tranquility of the nation, unleashing a period of grief and devastation.

The story of Eleni and Giorgis and their daughters was far more engaging and was clearly given all of the author's attention and skill. My only criticism about this section of the book (which is the bulk of it really) is that there didn't seem to be any character development or progress through the course of the story. Eleni, Giorgis, Anna, and Maria all pretty much remain the same characters from start to finish. There were a number of other minor irritations in the use and spelling of Greek words as well as some dubious chronological placements. Were they really listening to Theodorakis in 1953? And September 1953 seemed to last for about 6 weeks. One enterprising couple is on the verge of launching the most striking hotel in a region where Greek and Turkish Cypriots live in peace. Pausing to sweep up the crumbs of her toast, Hislop says: “You know, all families have secrets.” Perhaps some have more secrets than others? For instance, her mother has told her how her grandmother, who lived with them when she was a child, had grown up in a mental institution run by her father. One of her sisters had an affair with an inmate, which produced an illegitimate daughter who was adopted. Later, the great-aunt married another patient, a bigamist, who claimed to be a lord.

Synopsis

A really enjoyable read, albeit out of my usual genres. That said being a real Hellenophile and having a number of Cretan friends, I was always going to enjoy it. I do not know the area described in the book at all well, my friends live nearer Rethymno, but I have flown in over Spinalonga many times and was aware of its history. Foster, Sophie (16 June 2019). "Victoria Hislop: 'Ian was in a different league to me at Oxford - he charged me 50p to borrow his essays' ". The Sunday Telegraph . Retrieved 18 June 2019. The primary subject matter of the book was well researched and very interesting and original - that of the fate of Leprosy sufferers in pre-war and wartime Greece. I found this aspect of the book very interesting, the experimental treatments, the descriptions of how they organised their lives on the island and set up a democracy, the emotions surrounding being forcibly taken away from your families and made to live in isolation. I didn't know a lot about leprosy before reading this book, to me it is a biblical illness which is slightly distasteful and I didn't realise that patients sometimes lived in these isolated communities for years before the disfigurement and death happened. I also liked reading about the undercurrents of class prejudice in the face of this. I quite liked the character of Maria, even though she was quite a passive character and I usually prefer more sparky female protagonists, she was characterised quite well. The Figurine is set during the period of the Junta army dictatorship in Greece in the 1960s and 1970s, and Victoria’s story was inspired by the Cycladic figurine and the influence they had on 20th century art. She wanted to explore the crime that beauty and antiquity can drive people to.

Parts were a bit uncomfortable to read but overall I really enjoyed this book and would read more of her titles. Sonia's fascination with the city's history intensifies. She frequents a cafe where the elderly owner, Miguel, displays old posters of bullfighters and dancers; he whets her appetite with tales of Lorca and days gone by. Less convincingly, we discover that Sonia lost her invalid mother, Mary, when young and has learned little about her from her father. When Miguel finally tells the story of the Ramirez family, who once owned the cafe, the mysterious English Mary will be brought to life as her younger self - a 1930s Spanish dancer, Mercedes. The ground for this transformation is insufficiently prepared, and the large generation gap unexplained until the end, which tests our credulity. Thessaloniki, 2007. A youthful Anglo-Greek is desperate to make a decision after learning about his grandparents. I have been suffering from breast cancer and am unable to enjoy many of my usual hobbies, so I have been reading even more than usual. With that in mind, my friend Jill gave me The Thread by Victoria Hislop. She had really enjoyed it and so passed it on. I had never read any books by Hislop, but I had heard of her. She is an English author who was born in London, England in 1959 but was raised in Tonbridge, Kent, and attended Tonbridge Grammar School before she read English at St. Hilda’s College, Oxford University, Oxford, England. It was while at University in Oxford that she met her husband, the comedian and journalist Ian Hislop. He read English Literature at Magdalen College, Oxford. They married in Oxford on 16 April 1988 and now live in Sissinghurst with their two children.

Sometimes poignant but never upsetting, this book highlights the strength of love, friendship and resilience over adversity. Complemented wonderfully by Gill Smith’s beautiful illustrations, this is an ideal book for older early readers who are ready explore more complex themes associated such as coping with adversity and having respect for others who may be different from themselves. This cookie is stored by WPML WordPress plugin. The purpose of the cookie is to store the redirected language. Although Sofia only reveals that she was raised in a tiny Cretan village before moving to London, she eventually decides to help her daughter learn more by giving her a letter to take to an old friend in Crete. Roman započinje pričom o velikom požaru koji je pogodio Solun 1917.godine i proteže do sve do današnjice. Kako je taj požar odredio sudbine mnogih porodica, kako hrišćanskih, tako i muslimanskih, tako je i dolazak ll Svjetskog rata pogodio solunske Jevreje. Grad koji je nekada bio zajednica svih vjera, samo je u nekoliko godina to prestao biti, muslimani su protjerani u Tursku, a Jevreji su protjerani u poljske logore početkom ll Svjetskog rata. U vrtlogu tih povijesnih dešavanja pratimo sudbine različih porodica, različitih statusa i vjera. Of course that made me even more interested as I am sure he has a family story to tell,” she says, pointing out that, as holidaymakers, many of us might even have been lying by the sea in Benidorm, say, while elsewhere, people were still being executed in the mid-1970s.