Winter Solstice [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

One time actress Elfrida Phipps retires to a country cottage but is almost immediately reactivated through the personal tragedy of a comparatively new friend, Oscar Blundell, with whom she moves to an imposing old house, his shared inheritance, in Scotland. As Christmas approaches they are joined by a lovelorn cousin, Carrie, and her 14-year-old niece, Lucy, who is currently bothersome to the progress of her mother's new found love, and to her grandmother's hedonistic lifestyle. Sam Howard, troubleshooter in the textile industry, recently separated from his wife, arrives on the doorstep and finds himself unwittingly part of the soon-to-be snowbound family over Christmas. "Are you still snowed in with us, Sam? I hope so," says Edwina. "It would be such fun for all of us to be together." And so they all live happily ever after.

Lynn Redgrave, a good reader, voices the characters well but there's a recurrent smugness of expression that neutralises feelings of sympathy for this assortment who are destined by too many coincidences. A story without tension, the burdens of bereavement and finance and pleasures of romance and companionship are determined by unlikely turns of fate and the benefit of acquaintances who facilely solve the problems. --Running time 6 hours

--Lyn Took -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine andere Ausgabe: Hörkassette .

Rosamunde Pilcher's novel, despite its chilly setting, will warm the hearts of her growing army of loyal fans. Winter Solstice has all the familiar trademarks of a Pilcher saga, spun in her inimitable, homey, beguiling style. The story is told, chapter by chapter, from the perspectives of an eclectic array of characters. Former actress Elfrida--not very good by her own admission--leaves London for a geriatric bolthole in the country where she meets retired schoolmaster and organist, Oscar. Meanwhile, Carrie (Elfrida's second cousin), returns to London from Austria where she had a brilliant career in the tourist industry, only to find her niece, 14-year-old Lucy, sadly neglected by her selfish mother and equally spoiled grandmother. Finally, handsome Sam is recalled from New York by his company chairman to revive an ailing Scottish textile mill.

As one character after another must learn to live with their losses, they find themselves collectively spirited northwards, from Sussex to Scotland, by way of Cornwall. And, as events unfurl, slowly, surely, but inevitably, those in need find solace in unexpected places. While her characterizations are generally carefully crafted and entirely rounded, Pilcher's greatest strengths lie in her natural, easy narratives of everyday life and her thoroughly researched and captivating descriptions of scenery and surroundings. --Carey Green -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

The enduringly popular Pilcher (Coming Home, 1995, etc.) holds fast to a theme that has all but disappeared from American fiction: the healing comforts of domesticity and companionship. As winter sets in, an old estate in rural Scotland becomes a temporary home to an unlikely assemblage: Elfrida Phipps, a gently eccentric former actress; her friend Oscar Blundell, a dedicated musician and recent widower; Elfrida's distant relation, Carrie Sutton, an independent young woman recovering from the heartbreak of a failed love affair with a married man; teenaged Lucy, Carrie's quiet niece, who yearns to escape from her grandmother's London flat; and Sam Howard, a handsome textile-company executive whose American wife has just left him. As always, Pilcher is a sensible fairy godmother, bestowing happy endings upon the worthy and heartsick, while keeping the less agreeable characters on the other side of the Atlantic, where they evidently belong. The damp charms of the Scottish countryside are tenderly described; and the author's remarkably evocative sense of place and watercolorist's eye for muted detail help distract from the usual contrivances of a Pilcher plot (the unexpected legacy, the valuable heirloom sold to make a new beginning, etc.). In this little realm, this England, the men are sincere and the tweeds handwoven. Tea? (Literary Guild main selection/Book-of-the-Month Club alternate selection) -- Copyright © 2000 Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

In her new novel, Pilcher (The Shell Seekers) takes us to northern Scotland, where five vaguely connected people find themselves together at Christmas in a large Victorian house. They plan to "go pagan and celebrate the Winter Solstice with a lamb chop" but instead create a proper Christmas and soon come as close to one another as they are to the families from which they have been disenfranchised by death and cruel abandonment. Elfrida, a lonely retired actress, befriends Oscar, who is barely surviving the grief of the deaths of his wife and daughter in a car crash. Carrie, bereft after an aborted love affair, takes over the holiday care of her 14-year-old niece, Lucy, who is unwanted by her mother, grandmother, and indifferent father. Sam, in town to take charge of the old woolen mill, is reeling because his wife left him for another man. What lifts this saga above melodrama is the author's skill at creating believable, multifaceted characters with rich inner lives who sustain one another with good sense and gentle humor. Highly recommended.
-DMolly Gorman, San Marino, CA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Elfrida Phipps war Schauspielerin, Sängerin und Tänzerin - schön, eigenwillig und in den Augen ihrer bürgerlichen Familie immer ein bisschen wild. Nach zwei gescheiterten Ehen fand sie ihre große Liebe und verlebte glückliche Jahre an der Seite eines berühmten Kollegen. Als er schwer erkrankt und schließlich stirbt, bricht für sie eine Welt zusammen. Der Umzug aufs Land und die Freundschaft zu Oscar Blundell werden ihr über den Verlust hinweghelfen ... -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Rosamunde Pilcher, geboren 1924 in Lelant/Cornwall, arbeitete zunächst beim Foreign Office und trat während des Zweiten Weltkrieges dem Women's Royal Naval Service bei. 1946 heiratete sie Graham Pilcher und zog nach Dundee/Schottland, wo sie seither wohnt. Rosamunde Pilcher schreibt seit ihrem fünfzehnten Lebensjahr. Ihre Romane haben sie zu einer der erfolgreichsten Autorinnen der Gegenwart gemacht. -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verfügbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.