Simply wonderful
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I first read Asta's Book in three days, and have lost count of the amount of times I have re-read it. The plot is original and gripping, the characters are wonderfully real, and the description of life in 1905 is fascinating.
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A Must Read
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Barbara Vine has written a masterpiece. In the USA it's called "Anna's Book", in the U.K. it's "Asta's Book". Completely engrossing, superbly drafted plot keeps your interest throughout the novel. A novel to be placed next to her award winning ,"A Dark-Adapted Eye" on your bookshelf. A must read.
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WHODUNIT?...
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This is a beautifully written, well-nuanced novel of mystery and suspense that seamlessly moves between the past and the present. The past is told through the diaries of a Danish immigrant named Asta, who went to live in Edwardian England with her husband, Rasmus, and two young sons at the turn of the century. Settling down in East London in 1905, her loveless marriage and loneliness drove Asta to keep a journal of her innermost thoughts and experiences. Though married to a man who spent a great deal of time away from home on business and with whom she seemed to have little in common, she added two more children to her family, daughters, Swanny, her favorite, and Maria, the youngest. Asta's lyrically written journals would chronicle of her life, her struggles as an immigrant, her hopes and dreams, and her adoration of Swanny. They would also tantalizingly hint at a secret that would, ultimately, impact on her daughter, Swanny, later in life. Over seventy years later, those diaries, all forty nine of them, would be discovered and become a publishing sensation and a bestseller. Within its many pages would lie the missing pieces to a turn of the century murder mystery and the leads to the whereabouts of a missing child, as well as tantalizing clues to the puzzling circumstances surrounding Swanny's birth. This information would lie dormant until nearly a century after Asta first put pen to paper, when Asta's granddaughter, Maria's daughter Ann, would review the diaries and discover not only the secret of Swanny's birth, but the identity of a missing child, as well as that of a killer, who nearly a century earlier had butchered two women. This is a book well worth reading, and one that will command the reader's attention until the very last page is turned.
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WHODONIT...
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This is a beautifully written, well nuanced novel of mystery and suspense that seamlessly moves between the past and the present. The past is told through the diaries of a Danish immigrant named Asta, who went to live in Edwardian England with her husband, Rasmus, and two young sons at the turn of the century. Settling down in East London in 1905, her loveless marriage and loneliness drove Asta to keep a journal of her innermost thoughts and experiences. Though married to a man who spent a great deal of time away from home on business and with whom she seemed to have little in common, she added two more children to her family, daughters, Swanny, her favorite, and Maria, the youngest. Asta's lyrically written journals would chronicle her life, her struggles as an immigrant, her hopes and dreams, and her adoration of Swanny. They would also tantalizingly hint at a secret that would, ultimately, impact on her daughter, Swanny, later in life. Over seventy years later, those diaries, all forty nine of them, would be discovered and become a publishing sensation and a bestseller. Within its many pages would lie the missing pieces to a turn of the century murder mystery and the leads to the whereabouts of a missing child, as well as tantalizing clues to the puzzling circumstances surrounding Swanny's birth. This information would lie dormant until nearly a century after Asta first put pen to paper, when Asta's granddaughter, Maria's daughter Ann, would review the diaries and discover not only the secret of Swanny's birth, but the identity of a missing child, as well as that of a killer, who nearly a century earlier had butchered two women. This is a book well worth reading, and one that will command the reader's attention until the very last page is turned.
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Gripping not gory
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I picked this book out without realising it was written by Ruth Rendell. When I saw that Barbara Vine was her pseudonym I was disappointed. I thought that I'd have to plough through pages of gore and guts (I've seen too many trailers for Ruth Rendell murder dramatisations on the TV). It wasn't at all like that. The murder wasn't gory and it wasn't gratuitous. The story was well woven and intelligent. I didn't feel patronised - I felt stretched when I'd read it. I've read The Quincunx by Charles Palliser and Instance of a Fingerpost by Ian Pearson recently - both novels for those of you who want something a bit meaty to read.
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