The September Garden - Softcover

CATHERINE LAW has been a journalist for 22 years, having trained first as a secretary at the BBC and then attending the London College of Printing. She now works on a glossy interiors magazine and lives in Buckinghamshire.

“Had me on tenterhooks throughout and overwhelmed at the end.”

Synopsis: Set in London during the Blitz, in occupied France, and among the rolling Chiltern hills, this is the story of two cousins thrown together by the outbreak of war. Nell and Sylvie grow up quickly during the early days of rationing, blackouts, and the arrival of RAF planes in the skies. But even as the war rages on around them, the competition and jealousy between the cousins battles on - especially in romance. When the girls fall in love with the same man, he is spared having to choose between them as the war pulls them all apart and changes the course of their lives, with devastating consequences. For Nell, the only place she can ever find solace is inside the September Garden, her father's walled sanctuary. It is here that she decides to hide her most dreadful secret . . .

Critique: Catharine Law has an extraordinary gift as a writer -- the ability to draw her readers into a deftly woven story populated with memorable characters caught up in a web of all too human emotional entanglements and conflicts. Also available in a Kindle edition, this truly exceptional novel is highly recommended for personal reading lists and community library fiction collections.