A beautiful, quiet, thoughtful read that tells the story of Eleanor Lee – a 95 year old lady at the end of her life, packing and sorting her life in preparation for the end. When we meet her, she is nearing blindness and wants to make sure that some of her memories are kept hidden, after she has gone. A thoroughly enjoyable read.

Eleanor Lee is approaching the end of her life and will soon have to give up her independence to move into a home. Before she does she must sort out all she has accumulated over the years, and this includes letters and papers from her early life – a life she has kept hidden from her family and which she doesn’t want them to know about. She employs a young man called Peter to go through her papers and as their relationship develops she gradually reveals to him the story of her past. It’s a slow burn of a novel, for sure, and I didn’t really becomes involved until about half way through, but once I was hooked into Eleanor’s revelations I became totally absorbed and found it a moving tale of “what might have been”, the other life perhaps many of us might have had and still sometimes wonder about. The suspense was cleverly maintained right to the end with some skilful pacing and Eleanor is a memorable character indeed. A gripping and atmospheric novel of love and loss.

(I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.)

Eleanor Lee is fiercely independent. She has lived alone well into her nineties, despite her now near-total blindness. Now, finally, she has been persuaded by her children to move into a home.
She employs Peter, a recent graduate nursing a broken heart, to spend the summer sorting through her attic - papers, photographs, books and letters - ahead of the move.
These fragments of her own history unleash in Eleanor a long-concealed story of forbidden love, betrayal, passion, grief and self-sacrifice; and in their unlikely friendship, something is unlocked in Peter's heart, too.

Let me start by saying that I can see why this book rates so well - a beautiful story of an aging woman who reminisces on her past loves, betrayals, scandals and grief - and how this sort of story-telling resonates with millions of people. I see that, completely.

What I didn't get was any real sense of anticipation. The problem, when looking back at her life, we know she survives whatever life threw at her - she is telling the story, after all. So, while the prose was beautiful and the heart of the story was engaging, I just felt like nothing really happened for 400+ pages...


Paul
ARH