Category: Wenvoe Page Turners

“The Place of Tides” By James Rebanks

 

“The Place of Tides” By James Rebanks

This book is set on a remote Norwegian island, and the author writes about his time on the island helping Anna, an elderly woman, as she works with a friend, to keep alive the centuries old practice of harvesting the down of the eider duck. This is used to make the traditional and extremely valuable eiderdowns. Rebanks is a farmer and shepherd in the Lake District and had contacted Anna, a woman he had met previously, to offer his help on the island as he was feeling overwhelmed with his own life and decided this may help him to find a way forward. He left his wife and children to look after their farm and spent six months on the island, and he writes about everything that happened from early Spring until early Autumn. He writes about watching Anna and her friend prepare nesting areas and shelters to encourage the eider ducks to return to lay their eggs. The ducks line their nests with feathers which they pluck from their chests to keep their eggs warm. When the ducklings hatch and leave the island, the ladies collect the feathers and meticulously prepare them to be sold. Rebanks gains Anna’s trust and she allows him to work with her to undertake the many tasks that need to be done to preserve a way of life that has been passed down the generations. Rebanks learns the value of routine and undertaking purposeful work and the island became a place of reset for him.

The whole group felt the book was beautifully written and was calming and atmospheric and some felt it was a lesson on mindfulness. Anna lived a simple life on the island undertaking daily routines every day in all weathers; she was a guardian of the eider ducks and the island, battling all weathers and predators. Everything she did was essential to preserve this traditional way of life and the story about it gently unfolds throughout the book. Members of the group felt that there were some areas of the different characters that they would have liked to know about but, in the main, the book was well received and, after voting, we gave it an 8 out of 10.

 

Page Turners Reading List

 

Page Turners Reading List.

 

Secret Santa did an excellent job in giving preloved books to all the Page Turners. At the first meeting of the year, everyone was asked to provide a brief synopsis of their book (with no spoilers) and a recommendation for its inclusion (or exclusion) on the next Page Turners reading list.

We will be reading the following books in the forthcoming months. Why not read along with us and decide if you agree (or disagree..!!) with the reviews that are published in What’s On every month?

February The Place of Tides, James Rebanks

March The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, James McBride

April An Equal Music, Vikram Seth

May The Wonder, Emma Donoghue

June The Names, Florence Knapp

Happy reading

 

 

 

 

“This Must be the Place” by Maggie O’Farrell

 

“This Must be the Place” by Maggie O’Farrell

If you haven’t noticed, it’s the award season in the film world with Oscar and Bafta nominations for the best film and TV programmes from 2025 being discussed.

To start our December Page Turner meeting, a vote was taken to decide the best book we have read in 2025…and the winner was: This Must be the Place, by Maggie O’Farrell.

There are plenty of award ceremonies in the book world: the Booker Prize, Costa Novel Award, Pulitzer Prize for fiction etc. and now Wenvoe has its very own book award! The Wenvoe Page Turner BOAT prize. BOAT? The Page Turners choice for the Book of All Time. Our favourite ever read, from the 100 plus books we have read since our inaugural meeting over 10 years ago. The nominations, chosen by the 10 current members, were:

Where the Crawdads Sing

The Paris Wife

The Bell in the Lake

The Island of Missing Trees

The Seal Women’s Gift

The Marriage Portrait

…and the winner was…The Bell in the Lake by Lars Mytting, a story of mystery, history, relationships and intrigue set in 19th century Norway.

Do you agree with our choices of the winning books? Maybe not but that’s what reading and book clubs are all about, welcoming and celebrating and discussing the diverse nature of literature that is available for us to read

After all the discussions and voting for the two books, it was time for Secret Santa to provide everyone with their latest read over the Christmas period and eat some well-earned mince pies!

Happy reading in 2026

“The Women” by Kristin Hannah

 

“The Women” by Kristin Hannah

The first part of this book follows Frankie McGrath leaving her sheltered life, to become an army nurse in the Vietnam War. There is an emotional description of the gruelling conditions in the Evac hospital and the powerful friendships that developed between staff members. When she is transferred to a hospital closer to the front, conditions are even worse.
The second half of the book covers the difficulties Frankie meets on returning home – abuse from the public for Vietnam veterans, lack of recognition for the nursing skills she had developed, family rejection. Frankie suffers from PTSD but is unable to access help from doctors or the Vietnam Veterans’ Association. Her nursing friends from Vietnam support her. Several readers would have preferred more about these friends and less about Frankie’s romances. The book ends on a happy note welcomed by some, but too farfetched for others.
A good book makes you think. This book inspired many to research more about the Vietnam War, and reconsider what we knew of it in the 70s. It raised issues of women’s rights, racism, government misinformation and the horrors of war.
We would recommend it to others; score 9/10.

“Gabriel’s Moon ” by William Boyd

 

“Gabriel’s Moon ” by William Boyd

 

Gabriel’s Moon by William Boyd was met with mixed reception by the group being thoroughly enjoyed by some but others felt that it was a disappointing read and wouldn’t recommend it.

The main character was a travel writer who somehow became embroiled in espionage and managed to gain entry to several different countries becoming involved with historic events such as the assassination of Lumumba in the Congo. As such there was a mixture of fact and fiction in the book.

There were themes in the book of the main character’s relationships with women – among others his psychoanalyst, the woman who became his ‘handler’ – his brother and contacts made in the field, while at the same time he was dealing with the childhood trauma of losing his mother in a fire. There were a lot of different threads within the book that many felt quite confusing.

Some felt the book was well written with good description of places visited but others found it ‘bitty’ and confusing with no real theme to the story.

The ending was ambiguous but this is the first in a trilogy so any loose ends may become clearer in future books.

One of the group has read a number of books by William Boyd and felt that the story followed previous themes.

Overall, the book was given a score of 5.

“Perfect” by Rachel Joyce

 

“Perfect” by Rachel Joyce

Rachel Joyce wrote the bestselling novel of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, so the Page Turners had high expectations for another of her novels, “Perfect”. Perfect tells the story of two 11-year-old boys who plot to save their mother after she has a car accident; an accident she is not aware of. Class divisions, mental health, emotional abuse are some issues running through the book, culminating in a terrific twist at the end. Some Page Turners thought the book was a slow, unhappy, dreadful story with characters they couldn’t warm to or like. Others thought Perfect was a tragic, moving , well written novel with many characters who found themselves to be victims of their circumstances. It was scored a 6…so far from Perfect. What are your thoughts?

“The Phone Box at the End of the World” by Laura Imai Messina

 

“The Phone Box at the End of the World” by Laura Imai Messina

This novel is loosely based on a true story, following the Japanese tsunami that devastated Tohoku in 2011. Yui, a radio show host, and Takeshi who is a surgeon have suffered great losses in their lives, and the story follows their slowly developing relationship after an initial encounter at Bel Gardia where the phone box is situated. The concept of a wind phone is beautiful – a safe space where people can reveal their unspoken thoughts and memories to their loved ones, helping to heal their grief after loss.

Opinions were equally divided over who did or did not enjoy this book. The scoring was 6.5/10. Thank you Sandra for providing delicious eats and ripe plums from the garden.

“Orbital” by Samantha Harvey

 

“Orbital” by Samantha Harvey

Orbital by English author Samantha Harvey was winner of the Booker Prize 2024. The novel is beautifully written with distinctive and poetic prose. It covers a 24 hour period in the International Space Station as six astronauts and cosmonauts from America, UK, Japan, Italy and Russia hurtle through 16 sunrises and sunsets at over 17,000 miles per hour, 250 miles above Earth.

Their day is filled with individual tasks carried out with dedication and precision as they pass over and see the ever changing vistas of oceans, mountains, deserts and glaciers, a world without borders. They watch as a gigantic typhoon builds over the Pacific.

They have a daily exercise programme to offset the negative effects of the lack of gravity and at night they sleep floating about in their small claustrophobic cabins. We are given brief insights into the lives, histories and thoughts and learn how the cycle of daily orbits result in the loss of their natural sense of time.

This novel initiated a lively discussion and some very different reviews from the Page Turners. All agreed it was well written and thought provoking. Some were fascinated by the narrative and were of the opinion that any elaboration of the characters would have changed the whole tenor of the book. More negative responses described how they found it tedious and boring with no plot or character development, not enough human drama and too many lists and repetitive descriptions of scenes of Earth from space. Scores ranged from 4 to 10 and the overall score was 8.5.

Two Months’ Worth of Reports!

Two Months’ Worth of Reports!

“Less ” by Andrew Sean Greer

This Pulitzer Prize winner was boring, uninteresting and not at all funny. So said all ten of us Page Turners. Our score was the lowest yet of one out of ten. Less was clearly not more.

However, it was lovely as always to meet up together for a welcome cuppa and exceptional bara brith and brownies. Thank you, Nicola. You spoilt us

“Frank and Red” by Matt Coyne

Frank is a widowed older man who likes to keep himself to himself. Red is a six-year-old boy who is chatty and excitable.
Frank is a gruff, ill-humoured loner since the death of his wife, Marcie, whose “ghost” does her best to cheer him along or put him straight on a few things. His house and garden are now neglected, and he’s turned his back on the world. Then Red and his mum Sarah move in next door after Sarah’s divorce
Red hates the new house, it’s tiny compared to his old house, he hates his new school, none of the kids speak to him, excluding him at playtime, and one boy in particular is a real bully. It’s no better at home, no one to play with, and then there’s Frank, the grumpy old man next door who’s really mean.
The most unlikely of friendships, but somehow, two people who are decades apart in age, are thrown together by circumstance. What follows warms the heart to see just how the relationship develops. Frank and Red are new neighbours and complete opposites.
The group felt that it was an easy read with some laugh out loud moments and was sad and emotional. There were some issues that some members found difficult to accept. Firstly, why didn’t the teacher do more about the bullying of Red which was quite obvious as the story developed. The whole group questioned whether a six-year-old would have taken this difficult journey on the underground as he was trying to reach Frank’s son or would Frank have got away with driving on the pavement (which he did) trying to reach his son.
The story was heartwarming and uplifting but had varying scores between 5-9. The final score was 7.1

Many thanks to Jill our hostess for the afternoon who provided us with delicious chocolate cake.

“The Horse Boy ” by Rupert Isaacson

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“The Horse Boy ” by Rupert Isaacson

This book is a true story of a family who embark on an epic journey across Mongolia. The author, Rupert Isaacson and his wife Kristin had one child who was diagnosed with autism at the age of two. As their son, Rowan, grew older, the couple struggled to deal with and manage his severe tantrums and meltdowns, and in the book, they describe their feelings of anxiety, depression and exhaustion dealing with Rowan’s challenging behaviour but also their overwhelming love for their son. They consulted many doctors, trying to get therapies and strategies to help Rowan progress but were unsuccessful in finding any that had a lasting effect.

Rupert noticed that his son had a strong connection with horses and that horses had a calming effect on him. Rupert decided to find an alternative source of healing for Rowan and after extensive research, found that in Mongolia, the Shamans, who practice interacting with the spiritual world through trances for the purpose of healing, had a reputation for healing children with neurological symptoms.

Rupert is a journalist and arranged for a film crew to accompany the family on their travels across the country and to document their meetings with the Shamans and the healing ceremonies they participated in. This documentary financed this epic journey, and Isaacson records it all for this book.

Our book group agreed that the author had impressive literacy skills and wrote in detail; one member really enjoyed the descriptions of Mongolian history, the cities and the vast, beautiful countryside that the family covered in their quest to meet the healers. Concern was raised in the group about the rituals that Rowan and his parents all endured as part of the healing process, and we had a long discussion regarding whether this had a positive or negative effect on the family and Rowan’s symptoms. Many of the group said that although the author described the journey in great detail, this led to chunks of repetitive dialogue and the book became a challenge to read. This was another book that split the group in their feelings towards it. If you have an interest in alternative healing therapies and in particular the autism spectrum or want to know more about Mongolia and the Shamans, this may be a book for you to read.

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