Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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3 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Deeper than you first think..., 18 Oct 2009
Marshwood is the frequent setting in this beautifully written novel that at first appears to follow a tried and tested theme. It is only when you really get under it's skin, that you realise NF tells a much cleverer tale...
Octegenarian Bella has lived at Marshwood for so long, it's ghosts have become part of her everyday life. She tells a story of different kinds of love and the effect that these have had; not only on her as a young, married woman but also on her decisions present day. One of those decisions, though Bella believes it is for the best, directly impacts her grandaughter - Isla.
Isla is unhappily married to Richard and has two delightful children. They spend chunks of time, largely resented by Richard, at Marshwood with Bella and it is during one visit that Isla makes a decision that rocks her World and forces her to realign her life.
With well plumped, likeable characters, I really enjoyed this novel and will certainly be searching out more of her work...
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3 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Common Theme, 24 Oct 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
This is the story of three strong women in a story which is a common theme in writing novels, features a house, in this case Marshwood. A house which is falling apart, not just structurally but also the last inhabitant Bella has to face up to the fact that her health is failing and that perhaps it is time to move on. Moving on, means moving on from all the memories that Marshwood holds, not just for Bella but also for Isla, Bella's granddaughter.
Isla is continually pulled towards Marshwood where she spent much of her life, as her mother Callie flees to find something in her life that is missing, and it does not involve her daughter Isla. Callie although a strong woman throughout the book, is not as prominent in the story as Bella and Isla. However her role is somehow pivotal later on in the book.
Isla's marriage is failing in many ways and when returning to Marhswood, without her husband Richard, Isla sees the past come back to her and makes her question her actions of the past and of the future. Jack comes back into her life at a time when she needs more comfort than the house can provide. Jack has his own past demons to face, and quite horrific ones at that. However, things never turn out as they seem and the `Eden' that Isla and Jack create is shattered by Bella in spectacular circumstances.
Bella does not want to leave Marshwood, because there are too many emotions tied up with the house and her past, which she dictates to Isla as she feels she needs to write her memoirs down. This cathartic process makes Isla see her life differently even though Bella interferes, punishing herself for past misdemeanors and missed opportunities.
Natasha Farrant weaves a tale backwards and forwards, so the reader whilst reading about the current is so transported back to the past, the Second World War in Bella's case and a young innocent childhood, in Isla's. Farrant does this with ease and it does not jar the reader in any way. The device acts as a way of filling in the gaps in the story so we can understand all the characters actions.
A really good, book which I could not put down as it drew me in, and will anyone who likes characters that are drawn to a building which is much a character as Isla and Bella. Farrant describes Marshwood and the surround countryside so effectively, even the episode in Spain is described so that the reader feels they are walking the same path and experiencing the sights and smells of the area. A book to fall right into.
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2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Darned Good Read, 26 Oct 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
I always feel that designating a book a 'darn good read' is damning with faint praise as it sounds vaguely dismissive. It is not. Some other Eden by Natasha Farrant is one of those books which will turn up in bookshops on the 3 for 2 table, it will be in supermarkets and chain stores, it will never be reviewed in the heavies and will never make the Booker prize list. In short, it is just the sort of book that will be scorned by the literatti.
Well, it shouldn't be.
The central character in ths story is Marshwood a rambling countryside house, home to Bella and her husband Clement and later their granddaughter, Isla, abandoned by her mother as a young child and brought up by her grandparents. As a child she was inseparable from Jack, a local boy, and as they grow up their feelings for each other change and Isla falls in love with him. As teenage romances sometimes founder, so with Isla and Jack and it is many years later when Isla, now married for some years to the rather domineering Richard and with two children, meets Jack again one summer at Marshwood. Her husband is away, she has reached a crisis point in her marriage and the inevitable happens, almost encouraged by Bella who has always been at odds with Isla's choice of husband.
Bella, in many ways a stubborn selfish old woman, had had a love in her life but she remained faithful to her husband and her marriage, while deep down regretting she did so, feeling that she should have grasped the chance for happiness when it was offered to her. Her silent encouragment of Isla's affair with Jack is perhaps her way of making Isla have what she, herself, missed without taking into account that they are two different people.
This book kept me on the sofa one cold, rainy afternoon. No phone calls, no disturbances, just sat and read it straight through. I would guess that Natasha Farrant has read Rosamund Pilcher as I find there are similarities in the style and content of, let's say The Shell Seekers or Winter Solstice, and also the same warmth and happiness to be found in those stories. This is not to say that the author is a pale imitation of Mrs Pilcher, not so - I found Some Other Eden absorbing and well written and full of well drawn characters.
So I will say again, a darn good read and highly recommended. I thoroughly enjoyed it and must now get hold of her other title, Diving into Light.
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