The Blue Note: Complete & Unabridged

The novel is centred around three orphans: Teddy, Roberta, and Miranda, and as it is wartime in England, they are sent to Somerset to the adoptive care of two spinster sisters; Aunt Sophie and Aunt Prudence, living at a rectory. Although there is a war going on, their life with the sisters is idyllic and they are made to feel wanted and loved....more secure than they have ever imagined.

However, all good things soon come to an end, as the Committee for Evacuation moves in and Roberta is sent to another home.....seperating her from all the people she holds dear to her heart.

Life goes on and after the war the three meet under rare circumstances. Miranda is now a model and Teddy a Photographer. Roberta is working in Advertising. They have all changed tremendously, but the ties that bound them as youngsters, are ever present and the friendship continue from where they left off. See the stories they exchange with each other and where life takes them from this point.

A wonderful gift for an avid reader. I gave it five stars. *****

Reviewed by Heather Marshall (nettle-girl)


I got to page 464 and was still waiting for it to start...   December 16, 2000
0 out of 1 found this review helpful

I can't really fault this book for any particular reason, but like a marriage gone imperceptibly stale, something isn't right. Unlike another reviewer of the novel, I thought the best of the lot was precisely the dialogues. The plot was, however, not for me - it seemed to be more a question of a series of scenes, none of which could be individually faulted, and yet, as a whole and when put together, never really informed any other scene, never really got anything "started". Asides by the narrator about life in general and moments in particular were apt and sometimes astonishing even when mundane, but as far as the "thesis" of the novel is concerned I am unable really to make any assessment at all; I think I have to conclude that this is not a long novel but a very long short story. And since I am normally unwilling to start reading another book until the one in hand is finished, "The Blue Note" is basically the reason why I haven't ordered anything from amazon for over a month: I still have a backlog of four books which under different circumstances I would've easily finished by now. Perhaps as well as a Wish List, amazon should include a Wish Not or Be Careful List on its pages, books that when bought and from a statistical point of view tend to delay successive purchases...


A good plot marred by irritating dialogue   October 20, 2000
1 out of 1 found this review helpful

I should have enjoyed this book a lot more than I did. The plot is interesting, the settings and background well researched. But I found the dialogue extremely irritating, which distracted me from the book's good qualities. I didn't bother to count the number of sentences ending in "really I don't", "really he/she/it is" etc., but there are dozens; and far too many "do you see"s. This is a trait that has ruined other authors for me, notably Barbara Taylor Bradford and Hammond Innes, and I would have thought that good editing would pick it up. Disappointing, and a waste of a good storyline.