Book description
Queenie seemed born to suffer. Her mam died giving birth to her, her
drunken father George Kenney ignored her unless he was cursing her, and
only beloved Auntie Biddy provided an anchor for the little girl.
Growing up in post-war Blackburn, life could be tough when Biddy had to
take in washing to make ends meet - at a time when the washing machine
began to gain popularity. After Auntie Biddy's death there was only
Queenie to care for the home and to earn money, and no one to protect
her from the father who blamed his daughter for her mother's death. But
Queenie was resilient. And in spite of hardship, she grew up tall and
strikingly beautiful with her deep grey eyes and her abundant
honey-coloured hair. Love, in the shape of Rick Marsden, might have
released her from the burden of the drink-sodden George. But the sins of
the fathers would not be easily forgotten... The story of Josephine
Cox is as extraordinary as anything in her novels. Born in a cotton-mill
house in Blackburn, she was one of ten children. Her parents, she says,
brought out the worst in each other, and life was full of tragedy and
hardship - but not without love and laughter. At the age of sixteen,
Josephine met and married 'a caring and wonderful man', and had two
sons. When the boys started school, she decided to go to college and
eventually gained a place at Cambridge University, though was unable to
take this up as it would have meant living away from home. However, she
did go into teaching, while at the same time helping to renovate the
derelict council house that was their home, coping with the problems
caused by her mother's unhappy home life - and writing her first
full-length novel. Not surprisingly, she then won the 'Superwoman of
Great Britain' Award, for which her family had secretly entered her, and
this coincided with the acceptance of her novel for publication.
Josephine gave up teaching in order to write full time. She says, 'I
love writing, both recreating scenes and characters from my past,
together with new storylines which mingle naturally with the old. I
could never imagine a single day without writing, and it's been that way
since as far back as I can remember.'
