Dear Mrs. Bird
Perfect gift for any mom, sister, neighbor, pal.
So many times (so so many) folks just want a good book, one that is well-written but also provides a pleasing escape. How can London life during the Blitz, with its sheltering in train tunnels, rationing, and nervous newsdays be funny and heartwarming -- and be dubbed “a jolly romp” by serious professional book reviewers? It’s because of Emmeline Lake, the twenty-one year old aspiring journalist with a best friend named “Bunty” - who navigates a fledgling career with a rather “seen-better-days women’s weekly” magazine. Wide-eyed but determined, Emmy ends up assisting a stalwart, proper Mrs. Bird responding to women writing for advice - and quickly our Emmy feels compelled to reply to more pressing concerns than Mrs. Bird’s favorites re how to make a cake with ⅓ cup sugar and heavily-rationed eggs. These are women you root for, come to care about and will never forget. "I relished every moment of these books. What a joy! Hilarious, heartwarming, and unutterably charming." Jennifer Ryan, author of The Chilbury Ladies' Choir. - Sandy
This charming, irresistible debut novel set in London during World War II about a young woman who longs to be a war correspondent and inadvertently becomes a secret advice columnist is "a jaunty, heartbreaking winner" (People)--for fans of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and Lilac Girls.
Emmeline Lake and her best friend Bunty are doing their bit for the war effort and trying to stay cheerful, despite the German planes making their nightly raids. Emmy dreams of becoming a Lady War Correspondent, and when she spots a job advertisement in the newspaper she seizes her chance; but after a rather unfortunate misunderstanding, she finds herself typing letters for the formidable Henrietta Bird, renowned advice columnist of Woman's Friend magazine.
Mrs. Bird is very clear: letters containing any Unpleasantness must go straight into the bin. But as Emmy reads the desperate pleas from women who many have Gone Too Far with the wrong man, or can't bear to let their children be evacuated, she begins to secretly write back to the readers who have poured out their troubles.
"Fans of Jojo Moyes will enjoy AJ Pearce's debut, with its plucky female characters and fresh portrait of women's lives in wartime Britain" (Library Journal)--a love letter to the enduring power of friendship, the kindness of strangers, and the courage of ordinary people in extraordinary times. "Headlined by its winning lead character, who always keeps carrying on, Pearce's novel is a delight" (Publishers Weekly). Irrepressibly funny and enormously moving, Dear Mrs. Bird is "funny and poignant...about the strength of women and the importance of friendship" (Star Tribune, Minneapolis).