Review: A Week in Winter

A Week in Winter by Maeve Binchy
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The first book that I ever remember actually wanting to read as a teenager was Light A Penny Candle by Maeve Binchy, and I, along with my fellow convent school friends, devoured it! After that, I simply had to read anything that she wrote, so I was thrilled to find a book of hers that I hadn't read!!

A Week In Winter is set in the West Coast Of Ireland (which is where my family originate from) and so straight away, reading Maeve's descriptions, I could image the rugged coastline, and crashing waves of the Wild Atlantic Way. I knew immediately that I was going to love this book, and I didn't...I simply ADORED it!! It was better than anything I could imagine.

As ever, Maeve weave's all the storylines together, like a seamstress with golden threads, and the end result is a beautiful patchwork quilt of a book. I don't think anyone can, or will stand up to her writing ability in my eyes, but it could be nostalgia talking.

Chicky Starr is from a small village called Stoneybridge and when she is a young woman, and in love, she decides to follow her dreams (and her man) and go to America. When it all comes crashing down around her, she decides to return home, and along with an old spinster of the parish Miss Queenie they renovate an old mansion and turn it into a thriving B&B.

The rest of the chapters in the book are like short stories, each telling the different tale of guests or employees of the B&B - Rigger, Orla, Winnie, John, Henry and Nicola, Anders, The Walls, Miss Howe and Freda, and they all intertwine to make up a magical story.

On finishing this book, I found out that it was published posthumously following Maeve's death in 2012. It is hard to imagine that the world is now without such a wonderful story teller, however she leaves behind a spectacular legacy, and it seems fitting that every time I go to church, I light a penny candle for Maeve.

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