The Healing Stream

October 15, 2012
Time is a river, and it heals all wounds. You can take the girl out of the city, but . . . Monk's latest novel embodies these old sayings with an unexpected pleasantness perhaps derived from the fact that the mixing of these truisms with her straight-forward style is superbly well-suited to her portrayal of rural postWWII England. In 1955, orphaned Tessa's beloved grandmother dies, forcing her to live with her aunt and uncle on horrors!a farm. Determined to maintain a measure of independence by continuing to hold a job, the 19-year-old becomes a companion to Deidre, a disagreeable, wheelchair-bound woman her own age, whose depression and hostility recede with Tessa's ministrations. Tessa lives at the farm she has come to appreciate, but most of her time is spent working with Deidre at Fiddlers' Green, where she meets an attractive, distinguished author. Readers will very much enjoy the journey down Monk's romantic English stream.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)