Review ~ That Girl from Nowhere by Dorothy Koomson

Century
2015

‘Where are you coming from with that accent of yours?' he asks.

‘Nowhere,' I reply. ‘I'm from nowhere.'

‘Everyone's from somewhere,' he says.

‘Not me,' I reply silently.

Clemency Smittson (nicknamed Smitty) has known since her early childhood that she was adopted, but made a promise to her adoptive mother, that she wouldn't search for her birth parents until the time was right. Smitty's only real clue to her birth mother, is an intricately decorated box in which she keeps her most precious memories. Now in her late thirties, and after an emotional end to a long term relationship, Smitty locates from Otley in Yorkshire to Hove, on the south coast, which offers a new start for Smitty and a chance for her to get her burgeoning jewellery business up and running. The only down side is that Smitty's mother, Heather, recently bereaved, also decides to come and live with Smitty in her rented flat. What then follows, is a series of events, which lead Smitty inexorably towards her destiny and her discovery of a hidden web of  secrets. There are some difficult choices ahead before Clemency can come to terms with her past and start to look towards her future.

After an initial slow start, the book opens out into an interesting story of family secrets and of the heart break involved in the whole adoption process. It took a little while for me to warm to Smitty’s character, initially I found her weak and indecisive, but then realised that this was perhaps quite deliberate, and this helped  me , in some way, to understand her character more. The story is well explained and intricately plotted, although I did feel that some of the events were a rather too orchestrated, and seemed a little bit too unrealistic for them to have happened in the way they did.

However, on the whole,  I thought it was a good story. Not a page turner by any means , but perhaps more of a slow burner of a story, which covers some pretty hard hitting topics in a compassionate and sympathetic way.

My thanks to Sophie at ed public relations for my copy of this book. 

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