Willow Tree Bend by Kaye Dobbie
Subgenre: historical romance
Release date: 1 Oct 2017
Publisher: HarperCollins Australia
Format: ebook and print
Length: 344 pages
RRP: $8.99 (ebook); $29.99 (print)
The Taylor girls have a secret. Many secrets. The secrets have been kept for thirty years, and are about to unravel.
This story is more fitting in the women’s fiction area but there are some romantic elements.
The story of Hope in the present, Faith in the past and Samantha, Faith’s daughter, in the present are told. The book is mainly set in 1969 and 2000, but being pivotal to the events.
Hope Taylor has made it to the big time in America as an actress. She has come home to do a show in the hopes that it will boost her career after her movie flop, a show that involves the story of her life. It also means digging through her secrets or the things she would like to be kept a secret. She arrives in her home town and this causes friction especially as her sister has suddenly left to deal with a personal issue. Hope must try and pull things together all the while protecting her secret. She must deal with Faith’s disappearance, her mother Lily’s failing health and memory, and her own memories of the secrets she has held for thirty years.
Faith Cantani is setting up her new business in the town. She is nervous about this but when she receives a phone call, she then leaves for an unknown destination in Queensland. As the story unfolds the reader is treated to a young Faith’s life in the big city, Melbourne. Faith needed the space to live and experience life in Melbourne as she was seeking more in her life. She gets a job at a place called The Angel, and then her life really does change with what happens at The Angel. When it all falls apart for Faith, she returns home and marries local boy, Joe. Joe who has been in love with her since forever. Joe who has been checking on Faith while she was living in Melbourne and falling in love with another man. Joe who picks up the pieces.
Samantha Cantani is Faith’s daughter. She is a landscape gardener who loves her animals. She isn’t particularly interested in her mother’s past until it slowly unravels. She has to try and deal with the information that keeps coming out. She struggles between knowing and trying to ignore what it all means, until she becomes the centre of events. She does find her love interest, the man who bought the family home.
As mentioned previously, this is more a women’s fiction book but that has not lessened its interest as a twisting story. As a reader I do sometimes like to read the stories that have events across the years, sisters, mother and daughter. In many ways, as I was reading this book, I thought I knew where things were heading but when the ends were finally tied together there were some unexpected surprises in Faith, Hope and Samantha’s stories. This book was an enjoyable read.
Reviewed by Heather

Kaye Dobbie is an Australian author with an extraordinary talent for weaving timelines and generations into a compelling and cohesive novel that is both contemporary and historical. This is the second novel I have read, with one more still on my TBR shelf awaiting a quiet time to get to it, and it seems that the dual timelines is a storytelling tool she uses often.

The dual timelines in Willow Tree Bend are not as far apart as some of her previous ones but that hasn’t changed the masterful mystery and sense of suspense built throughout the story.

Hope Taylor is a Hollywood actress suffering a stall to her career, she’s at a crossroad and decides to do a reality show back in Australia called Looking Back, a show that looks back into the pasts of those featured and brings forth the little known facts and secrets. Hope goes in expecting to be able to control what the investigators find and what goes into the show then cash in on the publicity with interviews, TV appearances and maybe even a book; all great ways to kickstart her lagging career. I can understand all of this, it makes the show seem like a good idea… but if you have secrets to hide it’s not the greatest way to get back in the limelight.

Faith Taylor is Hope’s older sister, still living in Willow Tree Bend, and working on her own line of desserts. She hasn’t always been in Willow Tree Bend though, there was a time in 1969 that she spread her wings and moved to Melbourne. The fresh-faced 17yr old Faith hit the city lights of Melbourne and worked in the infamous The Angel nightclub. She returned to Willow Tree Bend and it was never spoken of again.

Now it’s 2000 and the prodigal daughter is returning for a short time to film the reality show designed to unearth all of the family secrets, Faith gets a mysterious phone call at work and takes off to settle unfinished business; leaving everyone at home worried about her because it is extremely out of character.

The story is told from three perspectives, Hope, Faith and Samantha. Hope’s storyline is in the present, Faith tells of her time in Melbourne in 1969 and Samantha, who is Faith’s daughter, also has a present day story arc.

There is quite a lot of mystery in these pages and Dobbie weaves clues slowly through the narrative so we are left making theories, connecting dots (with half of them missing) and drawing conclusions from the paltry store of parceled out clues; only to jump to the wrong conclusions and discover that there are more secrets hidden in the Taylor closet than anyone realised.

The Taylor girls were very close growing up and they always dreamed of getting out of Willow Tree Bend together, so when Faith left for Melbourne in ’69 it put a strain on her relationship with Hope. A strain that they struggled to get back from, Hope then fled to make a career for herself and the close sisters drifted apart. Hope’s return in 2000 sees her first trip back in a decade, and it shows in her relationships with the rest of the cast.

This distance between the sisters seems reasonably normal for considering the physical distance between them, until you start to discover the true depth of their isolation from one another and the strain in the relationship between all of the family.

Willow Tree Bend is a story that I loved; the mystery of the slow unraveling secrets, the characters, the vibrant drawing of The Angel in ’69. The recurring themes in the lives of the leading ladies is interesting to note and again, Dobbie’s writing is captivating. The weaving of timelines is fluid rather than jarring and I just wanted to keep reading, I needed to uncover all of the secrets; some of which were a little predictable but some of which blew me away.

I would have liked a couple more chapters at the end to see how everything panned out and what was resolved, there were a few too many unanswered questions. I am also still not completely sold on the fact that Hope would choose to do Looking Back with the skeletons in her closet, she didn’t know about anyone else’s secrets but hers were enough that she didn’t want anyone knowing so why would you risk it… The arguments put forward as to why she did were realistic and convincing but I’m still a little sceptical.

There is an element of romance, actually there are a few elements of romance because there is romance in the life of each of our leading ladies. We see the sweet rush of first love, the enduring love of a long term relationship, the slow unfolding of attraction in people who have been burned before and the excitement of coming close to your first celebrity crush. All of the relationships were sympathetically explored and we were able to get to know the characters better because of them.

This isn’t a romance story though, the main story is one of family and mystery; a story of long held secrets coming out. It was well written, captivating, vibrant and one that I would recommend wholeheartedly.

Willow Tree Bend is book #39 for the Australian Women Writer’s Challenge 2017.

Book blurb...
An interrupted phone call and a mysterious disappearance bring a family’s secret past crashing into the present…
1969: Small-town girl Faith Taylor leaves her family home in Willow Tree Bend and lands a job at the Angel—Melbourne’s most infamous nightclub. While Faith relishes her new-found freedom, she can’t help noticing that some things about the club don’t add up. So when a policeman reveals that a former waitress was murdered, Faith realises she must help to bring down the shadowy owner behind the club’s activities.

More than thirty years later, what happened at the Angel remains a closely held secret. When Faith disappears, her sister Hope—now a famous movie star—is left with an intriguing, though frustrating, piece
of the puzzle. But with a tell-all documentary film crew constantly by her side, how can she find where Faith is—and what she’s hiding—while making sure her own secrets stay hidden?

Faith’s daughter, Sam, is also concerned by her mother’s uncharacteristic behaviour. When she overhears a clue to Faith’s past, she’s determined to unearth the truth. What is the connection between the Angel and Willow Tree Bend? What does Faith’s disappearance mean? And what will happen when the final secret is revealed?


My thoughts…
Willow Tree Bend is an intriguing plot that took me from the city to the country to discover past secrets.
I do enjoy a sisters story and whilst an easy read I believe it would have benefited from a little more conflict between the characters, given the types of secrets being revealed.
This said, I would recommend it to readers.

My Thoughts

The previous work of Kaye’s, ‘Mackenzie Crossing’, was a superb five star read for me. So I was excited to read her latest tale. Whilst not as captivating, ‘Willow Tree Bend’ was still an engaging read.

“There were things going on here that I didn’t understand, like a dangerous undertow beneath a calm surface.”

Here is another dual timeline story, however on this occasion, it was only a thirty year gap - late 1960s and the year 2000. Dobbie does a great job at moulding and interweaving all the pieces of the puzzle to build suspense and present a good mystery - providing an even blend between both the contemporary and historical tale. This is a story about family secrets and how their revelation will have a major impact on the present.

This narrative is presented through three voices - Faith in the 1960s and Hope (her sister) and Sam (her daughter) in the present. We see Faith as a young girl from the country who finds work in the city and the troubles she encounters. Her sister, Hope (by the year 2000) is a famous Hollywood actress who has returned to her country home and learns herself, about what had unfolded back in the late 60s. Then there is Sam, and her story is all about reaching understandings in her relationships with family members and a prospective partner. Sam is struggling with all these well kept secrets and is trying to ascertain the truth.

“I was becoming more and more convinced that there was a dark underlying thread to this tale that I either wasn’t seeing or no one was telling me about.”

I have to admit to struggling a bit with the slowness of the tale; at times, not a great deal was happening and I found myself becoming disengaged from the story. Nothing really happened by a third way through and the pace only increased in the last twenty percent. I appreciate that Kaye was leaving little clues sprinkled throughout her narrative, but there was just not enough for it to be compelling.

Willow Tree Bend is a solid story with Kaye doing a good job of blending all three stories together very smoothly. Take some time to go back in time with the Taylor girls to unravel well kept family secrets.

‘The pain never goes away, does it? It fades, but when you dig a little, there it is, still hurting.’


This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher and provided through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The quoted material may have changed in the final release

It was 2002 and only a matter of days and Hope would be leaving New York for Australia – home to Willow Tree Bend where a film crew would be doing a documentary on her life. She’d signed up on a whim – a broke actress needing money after her last film had been a flop. But in the early hours of the morning she received a strange phone call from her sister, Faith – a rambling call in which she mentioned the Angel, and then hung up the phone. Hope was perplexed – her arrival in Melbourne couldn’t come quickly enough.

1969 and seventeen-year-old Faith was desperate to escape the confines of Willow Tree Bend and her mother Lily. Melbourne beckoned and Faith didn’t look back as she headed for the bright lights and excitement – the beginning of her new life she thought. When her cousin Kitty managed to procure her a waitressing job in a nightclub called The Angel, Faith had no idea how much it was destined to change her life.

With Hope’s arrival imminent and her mother missing, Sam was agitated and anxious. Her father didn’t seem to know where Faith was; her grandmother Lily was acting strangely and she wasn’t sure how to take the new neighbour. But Sam knew there were secrets in her family’s past – the little snippets of information she’d managed to glean proved it. But what could she do about it? How could she find her mother? And what was really behind Hope’s sudden home-coming?

Willow Tree Bend by Aussie author Kaye Dobbie is an excellent blend of historical fiction and intriguing mystery. Set in the past with Faith and the current day with both Hope and Sam, the novel flowed well and kept the tension ramped up. The slow-release of events was wonderful – it was hard to put the book down when I wanted to know what was coming next. I thoroughly enjoy this author’s work, and Willow Tree Bend was no exception. Highly recommended.

With thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my digital copy to read and review.