The Novel in the Viola by Natasha Solomon.

If I had written my top 5 books for 2011, this week rather than 2 weeks ago, this would have been there. I read a review for this book in a magazine and wrote it down at some point to my long list. During my last visit to the library there it was, all ready for me. Boxing day saw me exhausted, so I curled up in bed and decided this book and I had a date. Well it turned out to be one of those, I'm not getting out of bed til we are done type dates.....this book was lovely.

In the spring of 1938 Elise Landau arrives at Tyneford, the great house on the bay. A bright young thing from Vienna forced to become a parlour-maid, she knows nothing about England, except that she won`t like it. As servants polish silver and serve drinks on the lawn, Elise wears her mother`s pearls beneath her uniform, and causes outrage by dancing with a boy called Kit. But war is coming and the world is changing. And Elise must change with it.



At Tyneford she learns that you can be more than one person, and that you can love more than once.

Again, I found myself enthralled in a little bit of history, (I think I have a problem here..) and you hear me use the word lovely, not a word that seems to go with books too often, but it was just that. Beautiful characters (give or take one or two), beautiful story, beautiful scenery. When I finished I hugged this book to me and sighed, yes it really was that lovely.

A great big 5 out of 5 for me and a shining star for 2011. Here's hoping 2012 brings me more beautiful and lovely stories to read, a gal needs them from time to time.