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I happily ‘discovered�� Rosamunde Pilcher less than two years ago when I read The Shell Seekers. I adored that book! I immediately added nearly all of her novels to my list of must-read books. Coming Home was my next encounter with her work and I was equally enthralled. At that point I laid aside my prior misconception that Pilcher wrote only ‘chick-lit��, a genre towards which I am not personally drawn. There was so much depth to her characters and the writing was so intelligent and tasteful that I had to reevaluate my preconceived notions.

This book, however, fell short of the mark and landed more in the territory I had been trying to bypass. Now, that’s not to say it was a horrible book; in fact, I loved the first half of the book to pieces. Pilcher draws you into a story by the skillful introduction of her characters. This particular book, however, did throw quite a few names out that initially confused me. I eventually became familiar with each as individuals and managed to keep everyone straight. I delight in her ‘older��, more experienced with life characters the most �� this is where she excels, I think. These are, for the most part, older women that have the benefit of time and wisdom on their side. Violet Aird reminded me of my favorite character, Penelope Keeling, from The Shell Seekers. I would have been quite happy if Ms. Pilcher could have focused on Violet a bit more in this novel, but that wasn’t quite her intent. What did manage to aggravate me in September were the somewhat unbelievable actions of more than one character. Following an effective sketching of the characters, I thought I mostly had a handle on each of them. But then the story took a turn and some characters behaved in a manner that I just didn’t understand given what I had been told about them thus far. We started to venture into the dreaded waters of melodrama at the expense of what had been competently written characterizations.

I never wanted to set this book down; never considered abandoning it. Despite my complaints above, I was still invested in the story enough to want to turn to the next page and see how this would all play out. There was a mystery surrounding the return of one character that had exited the scene twenty years ago. She had left Scotland to marry young and move to California, never returning even for her parents�� funerals. Why did she leave? What made her decide to finally return after all those years? An invitation to a twenty-first birthday party couldn’t be enough motivation to make a reappearance, could it? I simply needed some answers!! Of course, Pilcher never fails to captivate with her splendid descriptions of setting. Here we spend most of our time in the beautiful country of Scotland, with a couple of detours to places like London and the picturesque island of Majorca. Her language always makes me yearn to visit these places one day. It is worth it for that element alone, but you may need a bit more to inspire you to read this one. I would say, grab one of the other two I mentioned in my review if you really want to immerse yourself in a wonderful story. This one, I would not highly recommend, but if you are already a Pilcher fan, then you may want to consider it as well. I plan to continue my quest to read more of this author’s writing, hoping that this is perhaps, for lack of a better word, the ‘worst�� of her novels. They can’t all be five star books!

"The past was always golden because one recalled only the good times. But what about the darker side of memory? Happenings better left where they were, shut away, like sad mementoes stuffed in a trunk, the lid closed down, the key turned in the lock. Besides, the past was people, not places. Places without people were like railway stations where no trains ran."