Book description
In the New Year of 1936, Gwen Purdy, aged 21, leaves her home to become
a schoolteacher in a poor area of Birmingham. Her parents are horrified,
but she has the support of her fiance, a recently ordained clergyman.
Her early weeks in Birmingham are an eye-opener: at the school she faces
a class of 52 children, some of whose homes are among Birmingham's very
poorest. One of the teachers, the elderly Miss Drysdale, proves an
inspiration, and Gwen begins to understand the appalling hardships
endured by the children as she is drawn into their lives.
Little Lucy Fernandez is a 'cripple' and an epileptic. Through her,
Gwen meets Daniel Fernandez, the elder brother in a fatherless
household. The family has roots in a Wales' small Spanish community, and
Daniel is a young man as fierce and passionate in his emotions as in his
social concerns. Gwen falls in love, and is quickly engaged in his
battle to win rights for the working classes. As the Brigades are
mobilized to fight the Spanish Civil War, Gwen has to face the fact that
Daniel has secrets in his past which she would rather not face up to...
Annie Murray was born in 1961 in Berkshire, and graduated from St John's
College, Oxford. In 1991 she won a SHE-Granada short story competetion
and was taken on by a literary agent. Her first novel, BIRMINGHAM ROSE
was published in 1995. This has been followed by several other
bestselling Birmingham sagas including, most recently, THE NARROWBOAT
GIRL, CHOCOLATE GIRLS and WATER GYPSIES.
