The Return: The 'captivating and deeply moving' Number One bestseller

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I am going to give the Spanish Civil War theme one more try. I will read Stone in a Landslide next. Maybe I will not be satisfied until I have read Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through a Country's Hidden Past, but I have told myself to stop buying books ...... Victoria Hislop read English at Oxford, and worked in publishing, PR and as a journalist before becoming a novelist. She is married with two children.

Very interesting to read more about the Spanish Civil War and Franco’s regime. I hadn’t known that there were concentration camps and forced labour, or even the scale of the brutality of it. I knew that Franco allowed the Germans to practice on some Republican towns etc but not that some of this was the Luftwaffe! Helena’s desire to find answers about her heritage dovetails with a growing curiosity for archaeology, ignited by a summer spent with volunteers on a dig on an Aegean island. Their finds fuel her determination to protect the precious fragments recovered from the baked earth – and to understand the origins of her grandfather’s collection. Knyga suskirstyta į tris dalis. Pirmojoje veiksmas vyksta 2001 metais Granadoje, kur Sonia su drauge atvyksta į šokių kursus, viskas smagu ir gražu. Tada ji susipažįsta su vietinių gyventoju, kuris jai pradeda pasakoti Ramirez šeimos istoriją Ispanijos civilinio karo metais, kuri kažkaip pakankamai akivaizdžiai turi būti susijusi su abiem personažais ir eigoje nuspėti tampa labai lengva.The result is a story that has little or no real connection with the place and the time; it could have been staged in Paris during the French revolution or in Moscow during the Bolshevik period. It would have made no difference to the development of the plot.

For me, while I found very emotional the Jews storyline and their ending, I 'd prefer that Victoria Hislop would make us feel a little bit more of her characters' sentiments and not so much "tell" us their feelings... I also felt that the end of the book was a little rushed, with Sonia's story being a little pushed into the last chapter and a bit. Considering the time invested in introducing this character at the start of the book it didn't do her justice to have it crammed into this short space. vasarą, atsižvelgiant į situaciją šalyje, daugelis mūsų tik per knygas ir turėjo proga pakeliauti. Pasiėmiau knygą tikėdamasi lengvo, atostogoms subalansuoto meilės romano.Her characters were completely flat. Good or bad, evil or moral. Poor or rich. There was no in-between and very little gray area. As others have mentioned - the rich were generally seen as corrupt and unsympathetic while the poor were honest, hardworking and loving. Hislop's heroes are trying to survive - not always with success - through all these difficult times. Their lives get tangled up with each other's history and the author does a really good job in unfolding her characters during such an era. We need real men in this country … Spain will never be strong while it's full of fairies.' What image of masculinity do the Ramírez males – #8212;and the other men in the book – #8212;present? Is maleness portrayed as a good or bad thing? How do women exert their power? The absorbing story of the Cretan village of Plaka and the tiny, deserted island of Spinalonga – Greece’s former leprosy colony – is told to us by Maria Petrakis, one of the children in the original version of The Island. She tells us of the ancient and misunderstood disease of leprosy, exploring the themes of stigma, shame and the treatment of those who are different, which are as relevant for children as adults. Gill Smith’s rich, full-colour illustrations will transport the reader to the timeless and beautiful Greek landscape and Mediterranean seascape. A lot of people who like this book say they didn't know anything about the Spanish Civil War. If the popularity of Hislop's work means that more people know about it, that's a good thing. Her heart is in the right place, she did her homework, she just doesn't have the novelistic skill to carry it off.

readers can’t fail to be swept up in her ongoing love affair with all things Greek and, in The Figurine, the focus turns to the country’s ancient statuettes and the looting trade that surrounds them.[…]a gripping storyline that leaves no stone unturned” Thessaloniki, 1917. As Dimitri Komninos is born, a fire sweeps through the thriving multicultural city, where Christians, Jews and Moslems live side by side. It is the first of many catastrophic events that will change for ever this city, as war, fear and persecution begin to divide its people. Five years later, young Katerina escapes to Greece when her home in Asia Minor is destroyed by the Turkish army. Losing her mother in the chaos, she finds herself on a boat to an unknown destination. From that day the lives of Dimitri and Katerina become entwined, with each other and with the story of the city itself. Quanto a Sonia, gostei da parte dela mas foi curta. Ainda bem que, no final, teve a coragem de começar uma nova vida.The Scalpel, the Sword: The Story of Dr Norman Bethune – Ted Allan & Sydney Gordon (MCCLELLAND & STEWART) This cookie is stored by WPML WordPress plugin. The purpose of the cookie is to store the redirected language. Hislop's writing is very mediocre. When she wants to compare something or show a contrasting situation she inevitably uses a simple metaphor to get the point across. The dialogue was simple and corny. Author rec'd letters from people who recalled and confirmed the brutal details of that era, and these add grace to the end of the story.

However, as I said, I absolutely adored it. It was a bit slow to get going but after a little while I was completely hooked and couldn't put it down.There is a romance between Mercedes and a guitarist, Javier. She spends the duration of the war searching for her love and taking many risks to find him. She never loses her love of dancing tho and she brightens many a person's day with her skills. Even in times of war, one must find joy and express it. Um relato fantástico do que terá sido a Espanha da primeira metade do século XX: como se viveu durante a Segunda República e a Guerra Civil, as touradas e o flamenco. What does The Return have to say about politics? To what extent does it affect real life? Did you detect a political bias to this book? If so, what is it? The story of Mercedes the young Spanish girl whos love of dance and a young guitarist named Javier takes her into danger during a war which has destroyed her family is excellent but I finished the book feeling I'd missed some of the crucial elements because Hislop's explanation of the history of the war wasn't gripping enough to keep me reading every single word.