Three Women of Liverpool is set in Liverpool during the Blitz in 1941. When you hear about the Blitz, you automatically think of London, but other cities were really badly bombed too. Seriously, Google some images of the Liverpool Blitz. The seven-night bombardment decimated the whole Merseyside area. The book takes us through those seven nights through the viewpoints of three women: newly-engaged old-maid Emmie, her sister-in-law Gwen and Gwen's daughter, Mari.
The writing was fine, but the plot didn't really grab me, which is odd because I'm a history graduate and wrote my dissertation around the Second World War, so in theory this should have been spot on for me. Also, I found the characters slightly annoying. The lead character, Emma, was a bit of a drip. I kept wanting to tell her to grow a backbone. Her sister-in-law Gwen is a real shrew, but we're never really told why she's such a nasty piece of work. What made her like that? Why does she hate Emma so much? Emmie's niece (Gwen's daughter) was the most sympathetic character. She has this bizarre crush on the sex-pesty boy next door who ends up coming to live with her when he and his siblings are bombed out of their home.
I'm totally going back to my TBR list for my next book.
5/10