Snow Angels by Nadine Dorries is the fifth novel in The Lovely Lane Series. I like the authors engaging writing style (like having a conversation with a friend) which drew me into the story. I suggest reading The Lovely Lane series in order. It will allow you to get to know the characters and their storylines since each book in the series builds upon the previous. There is a great cast of characters. I find them realistic and relatable. Most of them are friendly, but there is one or two squeaky wheels. The story concentrates on Sister Emily Horton and her husband, Dessie. They have loved Baby Louis since he came to the hospital and his adoption is very close. I like how the story unfolded and how it all came together at the end. We do get to catch up with the rest of the nurses. I liked getting to know Gracie Botherwaite. She is only fourteen years old, but she is very mature for her age. I like that she did not take any guff from her father. Gracie has great potential and I am sure that the staff at St. Angelus will help her achieve it. Teddy regrets his actions and misses Dana. He wants a chance to explain and see if they can find a way to move forward. Snow Angels is such a sweet story. It has its ups and downs just like real life. The ending is bittersweet. Snow Angels is a gratifying story that will delight fans of The Lovely Lane series.

I have done a complete disservice to Snow Angels and I will tell you why.... I should have started with the first book in the series, but that is my fault and not the books, for the most part I really enjoyed the book and it totally gave me Call The Midwife vibes, but I got lost and had to re-read parts several times, which drove me crazy.

So I’m going to for now give the book 4 stars and start from the first book in the series.

I've been following and enjoying the series enormously. I love the down-to-earth authenticity of these books. It's like being reunited with a group of friends. It gave me that much-needed feeling of Christmas cheer. Snow and Christmas are an immediate magnet for me, especially as we haven't had snow in this region since 2012. Christmas too this year is looking evasive for a family get-together with Covid-19 stalking us.. Feel-good-factor book. Just what the doctor ordered. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher.

I’ve loved the previous two books in this series, and I was so excited to read the third one.

The war is over now, and things are changing. Women have been used to working outside the home, and although the men are back, women’s lives have changed and strong women like Emily Haycock will balance family life and careers.

Little Louis is now thriving, and it’s wonderful to see how this formerly sick baby has grown, and how happy he is. But there’s increasing tension, as we wait to see what will happen with his adoption. Not everyone is in favour of it, and who is the mystery woman who appears in this novel? Why is she so interested in baby Louis?

As always in these books, there is realism and the harsh reality of life, so it feels very authentic.

The book is very character driven, and the characters are so well drawn, we feel as though we know them personally.

The build up to Christmas, with the wintry setting, makes for a lovely seasonal read.

A hard book to put down, it will draw you in and captivate you. I really enjoyed it, and was sorry to say goodbye to St Angelus for now. I’ll be looking forward to another one.

Another lovely book in this series.Its so wonderful Togo back in tie to their toe pen the hospital where these nurses works.They are like old friends you enjoy visiting and catching up with.#netgalley#head of zeus

Another brilliant book about the nurses of St Angelus Hospital. This picks up the story of the abandoned baby who is now being fostered by Sister Emily and Dessie. This is a great read, detailing the lives of all of those who live near and work in the hospital. Real life and every day situations, beautifully written, you feel you really know these characters and could recognise them if you met them in the street.

It was lovely to catch up with the nurses at St Angelus hospital in the Lovely Lane Series. The adoption is imminent now, but will there will problems ahead.
There is a wonderful cast of characters that feel like long lost friends now, there is also a mystery guest at the tavern and you wonder what troubles she might be stirring.
I love reading medical sagas set in this era and I can't wait to read more in this series.

It's like catching up with old friends.
As with the other books in The Lovely Lane series this one is a joy to read.

This is book # 5 in the Lovely Lane series. Strangely enough I have only read the book previous to this in the series, Christmas Angels, but I will definitely be going back to read the previous three to complete the series!! Whilst it is part of a series, it can be read as a standalone book but I would recommend reading them in order as there are a lot of characters which feature in all of the books! This book carries on from the end of book #4. We’re back with the nurses of St Angelus Hospital during another winter and the story focusses on little baby Louis who was found abandoned. He is in the process of being adopted by Sister Emily Horton and her husband, but they can’t adopt him until all attempts to find his birth mother have been exhausted. Just as it looks like the adoption is finally going ahead, someone turns up who may jeopardise everything…

I have to admit there are a lot of characters in this book. As I’ve only read one other in the series, I could remember some of them but others not so much. I love how the story begins with an unknown visitor to a Boarding House, which is close to St Angelus Hospital. You don’t know who this visitor is until much later in the book, but I loved the mystery that they bought. Whilst the storyline is mainly about baby Louis, all of the other characters have their own story which is incorporated into the book. Nurse Victoria, who is heavily pregnant, was a particularly heartfelt story and whilst everyone is eagerly waiting the new Christmas arrival, I was kept waiting on tenterhooks throughout the book to find out whether Victoria’s baby arrives safe and sound.

The location and era suited the storyline so well. Based in Liverpool in the early 1950’s, the war is over but the country is still recovering. The women working in and around St Angelus Hospital are still bearing the scars of war and there is still very little money or food to go around. I love these stories that are based just after the war as it just shows how long it can take to get back to normal. It’s also based around the early days of the NHS and shows how difficult it still is for the nurses working at the hospital.

The majority of characters are all so likeable, but of course there are the odd one or two who I just really didn’t like! Even after only read one previous book I felt like I had reconnected with old friends!! Right from the beginning of the book it felt like I had been transported back to Liverpool, and could hear the voices and feel the emotions that the characters were giving out. The storyline flowed well and held my interest throughout the book with plenty of Christmas joy! To be honest, I did find myself wiping a few tears away in parts, but the majority of the book was a lovely heart-warming feel-good read!

I have read other books by this author and have always found she is great at writing emotional sagas which pull you right into the story. I really hope there is another book in the Lovely Lane series to carry on this wonderful series of books!

This is the first of Nadine's books I've read and I read it in one sitting-who needs to sleep anyway? She has a wonderful, warm way of drawing one into her story and an intimate way of writing that makes it feel like chatting to a friend. From the outset we get completely immersed in the lives and worries of this familial community built around St Angelus hospital. We start with an apparently abandoned baby who is soon adopted by the whole docklands community, as well as his prospective adoptive parents . I don't want to give any spoilers but as the story unfolds, we are totally drawn in to the heartbreaking reasons for his apparent abandonment. I wept buckets in parts and wished I could reach into the pages to hug some of the characters. I felt quite bereft when it came to the end and I had to leave all these fabulous, hardworking, loving, caring women and men to their lives and loves in a forgotten world of Liverpool in the 50's . I heartily recommend this book and I shall be adding Nadine Dorries to my favourite authors list! Fabulous antidote to these dark gloomy days ! A well deserved 5*

I really enjoyed this lovely book. Great characters with plenty going on to keep the pages turning.

Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I have had the distinct pleasure of being able to read and review the four previous books in ‘The Lovely Lane’ series. ‘Snow Angels’ is the fifth book in the series and what a cracker it was too. My review for this one is going to be slightly different to normal as Mrs. Ginger Book Geek (who isn’t ginger) read it too and will be chipping in with the odd comment. Anyway back to the review I do go.
I took to most of the characters from the start, which is rare for me. Usually I only warm to one or two of the characters but in this case I liked most of them- with the exception of one. The one character we couldn’t stand from the start was Captain Rodgers, who is the head of the hospital board. Some of the things that he comes out with are just plain ridiculous. One such example is when he questions whether or not the hospital needs more drip stands because somebody could easily just hold the drip up. All he cares about is money. He is very Scrooge like in his outlook on hospital expenditure. He has the experience of money and of leadership but knows nothing about the practicalities of day to day nursing and that the matron wouldn’t ask for equipment if the hospital didn’t need it. I so wanted to jump inside the pages of the book to slap him a few times with a wet mop for being so stupid.
‘Snow Angels’ proved to be very addictive reading and then some. We were both hooked on the story by the time we got to the end of the first paragraph, never mind from when we got to the end of the first chapter. Mrs. Ginger Book Geek read this book first (well she did after she fought me for it) and she read it in under 48 hours which goes to show how she enjoyed it. I binge read the book over the course of a couple of days. Once we started reading, we just couldn’t stop. We immersed ourselves in the story and at times I felt myself becoming far too involved in the story. The pages turned increasingly quickly as our desperation to find out what happened grew and grew. We reached the end of the book far quicker than either of us had intended to which we were disappointed about. I don’t mean that we were disappointed with how the story ended but we were enjoying the characters, the storylines and the author’s writing style so much that we just wanted the book to continue on and on.
‘Snow Angels’ is brilliantly written but then we wouldn’t expect anything else from Nadine Dorries. She draws you into the story from the first word on the first page and she keeps that interest all the way through the story. Nadine has a writing style that is easy to get used to and easy to get along with. Reading this book felt a lot like a chat between friends. I know that might sound strange to some but it makes sense to us. As soon as we started to read we felt as though we had been reunited with old friends and that we had been parachuted back in time. I read that Nadine is a trained nurse and you can definitely tell because her attention to detail on medical procedures and her descriptions of how the matron used to put the fear of god into the nurses are first rate. Mrs. Ginger Book Geek is a retired nurse and whilst she was reading this book she occasionally nodded her head or she would chuckle or she would say ‘yep I remember that’.
In short, ‘Snow Angels’ is one hell of a book and a fantastic addition to ‘The Lovely Lane’ series. I would definitely recommend this author and this series to other readers. We look forward to reading more of Nadine’s work in the future. The score on the Ginger Book Geek board is a very well deserved 5* out of 5*.

SNOW ANGELS by Nadine Dorries is the fifth book in the Lovely Lane series but the first one I've read. I've often come in partway through a series and picked it up, but I do wish I had read the other four first. I found it took me a while to get my head around some of the characters and had I read them in order I would have been able to make sense of them far quicker.

At first, I found everyone to be a confused gathering of characters always in a flutter that I felt as if I was rushing around alongside them. Everyone always appeared to be in a hurry and this made the pace seem rather fast while at the same time being slow for me as I tried to play catch up on those I was only meeting for the first time. However, I was drawn in to the story rather quickly, even if I couldn't follow it as easily at first. But I don't put that down to the book or the author...but rather my own fault for not reading the books in order.

Set around the St Angelus hospital and the Lovely Lane home for nurses in 1950s Liverpool, SNOW ANGELS begins with a young woman seeking shelter from the cold in the Seamen's Rest boarding house. We don't know who she is or what she is doing here - only that she wanted to be near the Lovely Lane home and the hospital. Malcolm runs the Seamen's Rest and did not normally take in women as boarders but rather sailors who've come from the docks - hence the name Seamen's Rest. Malcolm tried to refer her to other boarding houses that would take the young woman in, but she was tired and adamant - it had to be here. Malcolm took pity on her and gave her a small room reserved for single occupants so she would not have to share with drunken sailors. The woman, whose name was Eva, was quiet and kept to herself - her sudden appearance a mystery.

Christmas is approaching and the staff at St Angelus are rallying around Sister Emily Horton and her husband Dessie as the finalisation of baby Louis' adoption nears. Emily is Sister Tutor at Lovely Lane while Dessie is Head Porter at St Angelus under the firm but fair hand of Matron. Along the way we meet many a character from nurses to doctors to clerks to cleaners to housewives - all in some way, attached to the hospital. But the focus on this story is baby Louis.

Little baby Louis was found abandoned in his pram in a garage a year before. He was severely underweight and malnourished that it was touch and go as to whether he would make it. The nurse who initially cared for him named him Louis, by which he became known to everyone. Instead of being sent straight to Strawberry Fields - a care home for children - it was agreed that baby Louis could go straight into the care of Emily and Dessie, who feel in love with him and set the wheels in motion for his adoption. The adoption, however, could not be complete for another 12 months until all avenues and attempts to find Louis' birth mother were exhausted.

Now a year has almost passed and baby Louis, who has grown into a thriving and happy little boy, would soon be their's. But someone is lurking in the background and is watching from a distance. Who is this person and what do they want? And then a complaint is made to child services about the raising of baby Louis - outlining that he is being passed from pillar to post as a handful of women take care of him throughout the day while Emily works. But baby Louis thrives in each person's company with always a smile for everyone...and everyone adores him. But is that enough?

There are also a number of background stories emerging to keep the reader engaged throughout. Nurse Victoria is now married to Roland Davenport, heavily pregnant and living miles away from the Lovely Lane home she had come to know and love. She makes a last minute trip to Liverpool for a sewing afternoon with her friends when the Braxton Hicks she thought was preparing her was actually the onset of labour sends her straight to the hospital to give birth. Teddy, Roland's brother, is a doctor at St Angelus and is on hand when Victoria comes in well into the final stages of labour. With her is Nurse Dana Brogan, whose heart Teddy broke causing her to flee home to Ireland before returning and continuing her nursing career at At Angelus.

Then there is Dr and Mrs Gaskell, Bertie and Ida Botherthwaite and their delightful granddaughter Gracie, Biddy, Elsie, Matron and many more that make up this delightful tale set in 1950s Liverpool.

SNOW ANGELS is filled with the warmth and charm of a feel-good historical novel, with the added Christmas glow as we approach the festive season ourselves. An excellent portrayal of working-class life in the post-war era of the 1950s, particularly for women who were just beginning to flourish. The war may be over but rationing had left its mark and the scars ran deep. Some goods were still scarce and everyone seems to have their own story of loss and yet against all odds they stood in the face of their own grief and loss and made the best of it.

The setting was incredibly authentic for the era and each character unique. I enjoyed reading their gossipy banter, some of which made me chuckle as we saw their various quirks. Some held secrets, some couldn't keep secrets but everyone had their own secrets. And despite their idiosyncrasies, beneath the surface and in the face of adversity, each of them ultimately showed they had a warm heart.

While this was my introduction the staff at St Angelus and Lovely Lane, the series should be read from the beginning to enjoy the characters and their foibles to their fullest extent.

A delightfully sweet story that I ended up thoroughly enjoying, SNOW ANGELS is both charming and gratifying and will delight both fans of historical fiction and the Lovely Lane series.

I would like to thank #NadineDorries, #NetGalley and #HeadOfZeus for an ARC of #SnowAngels in exchange for an honest review.

Lovely Lane is the perfect name for this series - it is a truly lovely series! I hold my hands up that I haven't read every book, but that's not down to lack of desire - more lack of time!

As we join the staff of St Angelus once more, Christmas is approaching and with it the deadline for Sister Tutor Emily Horton and her husband, Head Porter Dessie to complete the adoption of little Louis. With Nurse Victoria Baker now heavily pregnant it looks as if everyone will have plenty to celebrate this festive season, but then things don't always run smoothly where babies are involved, do they?

Another wonderful read from Nadine Dorries. Full of warmth and charm and perfectly appropriate to the time it is set in, this is a feel-good novel which will give you the Christmas glow as we approach the season ourselves. The characters are beautifully drawn; the story is a sheer delight with plenty of ups and downs and a good solid ending, wrapping everything up neatly. A great peek at how many people are involved in the smooth running of a hospital (and how well the old matron-style system worked). So enjoyable, and worth all five stars.

My thanks to publisher Head of Zeus for my copy via NetGalley, and to Vicky Joss for my place on this tour.

It’s always a joy to catch up with the lovely nurses at the St Angelus Hospital and Christmas looks set to be fraught with plenty of heartache, drama and emotion for the nurses in Nadine Dorries’ latest captivating instalment, Snow Angels.

Christmas is a time for family and Sister Emily Haycock is anxiously counting down the days until the signing of the final adoption papers for her precious baby Louis. Emily and her husband Dessie cannot wait until they can finally be a proper family and with their long-held dream about to come to fruition, nothing and nobody will spoil this most wonderful time…or will it? A dangerous enemy seems determined to pull out all the stops and do whatever it takes to prevent Emily and Dessie from holding their much-longed for child in their arms. Will Emily’s desperation for a child force her down a dark and hazardous path that could end up costing her everything? Is baby Louis going to be snatched from her arms at the eleventh hour? Or will a Christmas miracle give her and Dessie what their hearts desire the most?

Victoria Baker, now Mrs Davenport, is heavily pregnant with her child. With snow falling in earnest, Victoria thinks that there is plenty of time until she brings her child into the world, but how sure is she about the dates? Did she miscalculate and make a grave mistake about the due date of her baby? Has she unwittingly ended up putting herself and her unborn child in danger? Will Victoria end up losing her child? Or will there be further surprises in store for her?

With a mysterious figure obsessively watching St Angelus from a distance and a perfect stranger turning up asking for shelter at Malcolm Coffey’s bed and breakfast, the nurses at the hospital need to prepare themselves for a Yuletide season they will not easily forget.

A fantastic saga that is ideal for curling up with and losing oneself in on a cold autumn afternoon, Nadine Dorries’ Snow Angels will make readers laugh, cry and lose sleep as they find themselves completely captivated by this spellbinding read.

Nadine Dorries creates wonderful characters you cannot help but love and cheer for and that is certainly the case in Snow Angels. With characters who are so vivid and realistic that they begin to feel like close friends at the end of the book and plenty of shocks, surprises and twist and turns, find yourself a comfy chair and pour yourself a hot drink and indulge in this stellar saga from a terrific talent.

This was the fifth book in the series but the first one I had read. How I wish I had read the others first though! It took a little while to get my brain around the characters and I think if I had read the books in order, it wouldn't have taken as long.

The book concentrates on the story of Emily and Dessie, and their adoption of baby Louis - a baby who was found underweight and sickly in a garage. Most of the people in their neighbourhood are kind, decent people but there are a couple who are less than helpful. And what is Eva's story?

I think this is an excellent portrayal of working-class life in the 50's though, especially the role of women at that time. The war is over but some goods are still scarce, the scars run deep and everyone seems to have lost someone. There is a big difference between the "haves" and the "have nots" but there are things going on behind closed doors even in the more affluent homes. The poor women who are trying to make ends meet with too many children and not enough money though, I really felt for them.

This novel was really well written and I enjoyed it. I am looking forward to reading more in the series, probably a good idea to start with the first book! I only wished the ending of this book wasn't so rushed.

4 stars from me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Head of Zeus.

A real tearjerker but lovely book.

The story focuses around baby Louis who is found in a garage and goes on to be cared for by two nurses, Emily and Dessie. Everybody at St Angelus hospital where the nurses are known as snow angels soon come to love him as he grows and becomes a happy child.
This is a nice easy going story with some lovely characters and a few sobs. I was easily lulled into the book and enjoyed every page of its warmth and familiarity.
Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to read and review this book. x

This is the fifth book in the series and I have read them all.
It was great to hear more about the characters that we had met in previous books and to see some new characters.
I felt that the storyline was not as good as the previous books and that it was slow moving.
However, it was still a pleasant read.

This is the 5th book in the series and it picks up wonderfully a short time after the last book finished. I am not sure how easily it could be read as a standalone book as some of the background is not explained & the character's quirks & personalities aren't explained/developed as they would be in a standalone novel. It was lovely to meet the new characters & see how some of the previously peripheral characters became central to this story.

It is quite a fast paced book, easily read & with a storyline that is gentle yet heartwrenching at times. There were no great surprises, but sometimes you just want a story that unfolds naturally without huge twists & turns!

Overall an excellent addition to the "Lovely Lane" series

Disclosure: I received an advance copy of this book free via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

A historical fiction of a different sorts where the setting was the hospital, and the characters were the nurses and doctors of the St. Angelus. The nurses were called the Snow Angels and rightly so, as they were the ones who made patients feel better.

It was Christmas time, a time of joy, but secrets seemed to be cropping up in this hospital. Baby Louis found abandoned in the garage was taken in by the nurses and looked after, and one of them wanted to adopt him. There was a young woman watching the hospital and searching for the past. A baby was to be born in the blizzard. All this and more happened bringing a storm in their lives.

My first book by Nadine Dorries, though 5th in the series, it took me a while to get to know the characters.. There was quite a flurry of events which occurred in the hospital. But slowly the charcters settled into me and I could go with the flow.

The author, a nurse herself, had written a fabulous story set in the 1950 in an authentic setting. I reminded me of the times I use to work at the hospital. The emotions in the story especially the story concerning baby Louis caught me by surprise and pulled me deeper into the story.

Each character was so unique, their personalities leaped off the screen. I enjoyed knowing their various quirks. They were human and humane in their ways. Secrets came out in this book. But all it showed was that the characters had a warm heart.

The series ought to be read from the beginning to enjoy the characters and their lives more. A sweet read.