Rosy Thornton

Guest: Rosy Thornton- author of 'Hearts and Minds', 'More Than Love Letters' and most recently,
'Crossed Wires'. For more information, visit www.rosythornton.com

Books

Crossed Wires by Rosy Thornton
This is the story of Mina, a girl at a Sheffield call centre whose next customer in the queue is
Peter, a Cambridge geography don who has crashed his car into a tree stump when swerving to avoid a
cat. Despite their obvious differences, they've got a lot in common -- both single, both parents,
both looking for love. Could it be that they've just found it? CROSSED WIRES is an old-fashioned
fairy tale. It is about the small joys and tribulations of parenthood; about one-ness and two-ness;
about symmetry and coincidence; about the things that separate us and the things that bring us
together.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Orphaned Jane Eyre grows up in the home of her heartless aunt and later attends a charity school
with a harsh regime, enduring loneliness and cruelty. This troubled childhood strengthens Jane's
natural independence and spirit - which prove necessary when she finds a position as governess at
Thornfield Hall. However, when she finds love with her sardonic employer, Rochester, the discovery
of his terrible secret forces her to make a choice. Should she stay with him and live with the
consequences, or follow her convictions, even if it means leaving the man she loves? A novel of
intense power and intrigue, Jane Eyre (1847) dazzled and shocked readers with its passionate
depiction of a woman's search for equality and freedom.

North and South by Elisabeth Gaskell
When her father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her c
omfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the north of England. Initially repulsed by
the ugliness of her new surroundings in the industrial town of Milton, Margaret becomes aware of the
poverty and suffering of the local mill workers and develops a passionate sense of social justice.
This is intensified by her tempestuous relationship with the mill-owner and self-made man, John
Thornton, as their fierce opposition over his treatment of his employees masks a deeper attraction.
In "North and South", Elizabeth Gaskell skillfully fused individual feeling with social concern, and
in Margaret Hale created one of the most original heroines of Victorian literature.

Gaudy Night by Dorothy L.Sayers
Harriet Vane has never dared to return to her old Oxford college. Now, despite her scandalous life,
she has been summoned back...At first she thinks her worst fears have been fulfilled, as she
encounters obscene graffiti, poison pen letters and a disgusting effigy when she arrives at sedate
Shrewsbury College for the 'Gaudy' celebrations. But soon, Harriet realises that she is not the only
target of this murderous malice - and asks Lord Peter Wimsey to help.

Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks
Set before and during the great war, "Birdsong" captures the drama of that era on both a national
and a personal scale. It is the story of Stephen, a young Englishman, who arrives in Amiens in 1910.
His life goes through a series of traumatic experiences, from the clandestine love affair that tears
apart the family with whom he lives, to the unprecedented experiences of the war itself.

Mothernight by Sarah Stovell
'I was beginning to realise that time didn't move forwards here. It just spun round and round,
circling an old date, endlessly'. So says seventeen-year-old Olivia who spends the summer at the
home of her boarding school friend, the brilliant, distant, lonely Leila. Their intense relationship
 circles Leila's painful past: a dreadful accident when she was five, and then the sudden death of
her infant brother four years later. Olivia meets Leila's childhood friend Rosie, a disturbing,
manipulative influence, and Katherine, Leila's step-mother: bitter, damaged and unforgiving. Now on
the verge of adulthood, Leila decides to confront her past and her family, but the atmosphere of
blame and recrimination hangs as heavy as the summer heat and will prove more powerful than she
could have ever imagined.

The Heat of the Day by Elizabeth Bowen
On the face of it the story is about a woman who is given reason to suspect that the man with whom
she is in love is betraying his country Another man is on his track, and a triangular situation
develops. All the elements of a hunter-and-hunted thriller are here, but what she makes of them is
an internal drama of remarkable perception and understanding in a domestic setting in embattled
London. Her imagin-ative interpretation of the effect of war on the manners, morals and emotions of
those not directly engaged in the fighting is drawn from an uncannily poignant recall of the wartime
London scene.

Coming up next week, freelance writer Mark Farley. Mark and I will be chatting about books from this
year and great Christmas presents (books) to give to your nearest and dearest.