Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel: the perfect uplifting holiday read from the author of The Keeper of Lost Things

Such a good read! It's not always obvious where this one is heading, but with plenty to read it's only a matter of time ... Tilda is a grown woman; her story is told along with the younger Tilly, and it's an interesting tale. Tilly is a child who understands things beyond her years - and what she doesn't actually know for fact, she assumes, and often with hilarious results! This is a packed read; so much happening that it's an easy novel to get through. Tilly is a child who lives in an adult world and quite often utters malapropisms when she gets her words mixed up, causing much giggling! A tale of mothers, daughters and friends, this is a lively novel with ups and downs. Tilly isn't your usual little girl and she grows up into a fairly solitary adult. This book covers it all, from early childhood right through adulthood and is one I've enjoyed - although for a while I did wonder where the title came from! What I really appreciated about it, is that all the questions the story raises are answered by the final page. Definitely MY kind of read! If you want something just a bit different in a family story full of revelations, then this is one I recommend. My thanks to publisher John Murray Press for my copy via NetGalley. The choice to read, and this review, is entirely my own.

I absolutely adored this quirky, magical, funny, slightly sad book. One of those books I didn't want to read too quickly as it would be over too soon. Tilda has come to her Mother's home in Brighton to clear it out as her Mother has recently died. Tilda always had a very strained relationship with her Mother and after she'd sent Tilda to boarding school, and away from the only place she was ever really happy, their relationship was never the same. Tilda's Mother was a troubled woman who had been in an asylum and had electric shock treatment. There she had met Queenie, of the title of the book, and they had stayed friends. So when Tilda's Dad left to find work elsewhere and didn't come back Tilda and her Mother moved to Queenie Malone's Paradise Hotel in Brighton, and soon were part of the mad, dysfunctional (very funny!) group of people who lived there. The story flicked back and forth between when Tilda was younger and the present day. In the present day, while clearing out her Mother's paperwork, Tilda found a box of diaries which she slowly read through, and these explained what actually happened when Tilda was younger, why they moved to Brighton and why her Mother felt she had to send Tilda away to boarding school. Quite sad in places but very revealing. I don't want to say too much about the book and ruin things but there are definitely a few surprises along the way, more towards the latter half of the book. Tilda as a child was delightful and absolutely hilarious with her take on certain words and phrases. I was laughing a lot in this book! Bermondsey was one of my favourites - '... apart from dissecting my food with geometric precision, a phobia of boiled eggs, growing windmills in the back garden and believing that God sent sinners to Bermondsey, I was completely normal', just about sums up Tilda. I can't express how absolutely delightful, magical and funny I found this book, definitely a keeper.

An absolute joy from start to finish. I couldn't put it down. Such colourful characters I immediately took to my heart. Ruth, whatever you do... never stop writing! I couldn't read this book quick enough, but then I was gutted that I had finished it. I was just the same with 'Lost Things' and Sally Red Shoes. Literary perfection :)