The White Lady is only the second standalone novel that Jacqueline Winspear, best known for her long-running Masie Dobbs series, has published. Fans of the Masie Dobbs books, however, will feel right at home in the pages of The White Lady because this one is set much in the same time period of those, with its flashbacks to both World Wars I and II and the present day being set in 1947.
The novels central character, Elinor White, is a veteran of both those wars, having first been part of the resistance movement in Belgium as a pre-teen with the kind of natural instincts that made her a deadly adversary to Belgium's German occupiers. Then just two decades later, as a young woman with the training and experience to become a resistance leader herself, she would return to Belgium to fight the Germans one more time.
But now, Elinor is living alone in a small rural Kent village. All the locals know about her is that she is living in a "grace and favor" cottage, a privilege granted by the Crown only to those who have performed a very valuable service for their country. Villagers spot the woman on her long daily walks or shopping in the village on occasion, but she only speaks to anyone when necessary to conduct her business. She seems to have no friends or visitors, instead much preferring to enjoy the solitude that village life offers her. But while everyone speculates about what she could have possibly done to deserve the honor of her living arrangement, none of them realize that Elinor White is probably the bravest person living in Shacklehurst. Too, for good reason she is also likely to be the most guilt-ridden person living among them.
That all changes one day when a little girl runs up and speaks to Elinor as she walks past their home. The woman is immediately drawn to the little girl, even to the point that she lingers long enough to engage the child's mother in conversation for a few minutes. From that moment on, Elinor looks forward to encountering the mother and daughter again. But when she learns that the little family is in imminent danger because Jim Mackie is being coerced into rejoining the powerful London crime family he is so desperate to escape, Elinor knows that she has to save that little girl from growing up in that lifestyle.
If anyone can save the Jim Mackie family, it will be her. And she is ready - and willing - to do the job.
The White Lady is a hard novel to pigeonhole. On the one hand, it can be called historical fiction. But it is also a coming-of-age novel, a crime novel, and a thriller involving Britain's secret services. The novel alternates flashbacks to both World Wars with Elinor's 1947 attempts to extract the Mackies from the father and brothers who are determined to force Jim back into the family business at any cost. What I found remarkable about The White Lady is that both the flashbacks and the present day segments of the story are compelling page-turners, meaning that I never regretted when one plot line segued into the next. That is certainly not always the case with novels constructed the way this one is.
There is a whole lot happening in The White Lady, and I recommend it. It is a solid four-star novel.
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| Jacqueline Winspear author photo |
I've read a few of Winspear's Maisie Dobbs books, but this one sounds even better to me. Elinor's life sounds very interesting! And it's unusual for both past and present timelines to be equally compelling. Another book for my TBR list. :D
ReplyDeleteI haven't read the Maisie Dobbs series, mainly I think, because they just sound a little too cosy for my taste. Somehow those never seem very real to me. This one is tamely written but covers some pretty gritty plot turns.
DeleteI liked the two Maisie Dobbs books that I read, but I didn't love them, and I never really wanted to read any more in the series. I just didn't connect enough with the characters.
DeleteInteresting. I have run across quite a few really avid fans of the series, but they don't feel quite "right" for me so I never investigated them at all.
DeleteI am currently reading the fourth book in the Maisie Dobbs series. This sounds like a book I want to read someday. Maybe it will show up at the book sale in a year or two.
ReplyDeleteIt's my first experience with Winspear's work, Tracy, so I have nothing to compare it to. As I mentioned to Lark up above, it's style is a bit on the tame side but parts of the story still manage to be fairly gritty, so I could get into it pretty easily. I hope you find it out there somewhere.
DeleteLook forward to getting hold of this at some stage, from the library I expect. I like her Maisie Dobbs books a lot - once they got into their stride - the first couple were just 'ok'. But that's par for the course with most book series I find.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty confident that you will enjoy this one, Cath. I like reading novels set immediately after WWII to remind myself that it didn't all suddenly end when the official shooting at each other finally stopped.
DeleteI enjoyed the first few Maisie Dobbs novels, but have always been terrible at keeping up with series. I didn't know that she wrote stand-alones, too, so this is probably a better way for me to enjoy this author!
ReplyDeleteAs far as I can tell, this is only the second standalone she's written, but her shorter work has also been included in quite a few anthologies, too, so there's that.
DeleteI read the first Maisie Dobbs novel when it came out, but I never went on with the series for some reason. I need to! This book sounds great as well. I'm always up for a compelling WWII novel.
ReplyDeleteTaking a page from your book, I'd give this one a PG rating. That doesn't always work well for me, but in this case it's mostly only "language" limitations that earn the rating, not a taming down of plot elements, so I enjoyed it.
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