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Solace Of The Road
by
Siobhan Dowd
Holly’s story will leave a lasting impression on all who travel with her.
Memories of mum are the only thing that make Holly Hogan happy. She hates her foster family with their too-nice ways and their false sympathy. And she hates her life, her stupid school, and the way everyone is always on at her. Then she finds the wig, and everything changes. Wearing the lo...more
Memories of mum are the only thing that make Holly Hogan happy. She hates her foster family with their too-nice ways and their false sympathy. And she hates her life, her stupid school, and the way everyone is always on at her. Then she finds the wig, and everything changes. Wearing the lo...more
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Have you ever wondered what would happen if all the YA heroes and heroines got together to discuss the times they saved the world?
Jace&Clary: "We stopped our dad from starting a demon apocalypse and then got together."
Edward&Bella: "We stopped a vampire war after we made a demon baby parasite."
Bethany&Xavier: "We tripled the visits to our local church!"
Everyone else: *blank stare...more
Have you ever wondered what would happen if all the YA heroes and heroines got together to discuss the times they saved the world?
Jace&Clary: "We stopped our dad from starting a demon apocalypse and then got together."
Edward&Bella: "We stopped a vampire war after we made a demon baby parasite."
Bethany&Xavier: "We tripled the visits to our local church!"
Everyone else: *blank stare...more
view all 4 comments
"Your name's made out of cloud, Holly."
Initial Final Page Thoughts.
Ms Dowd’s books sure do play havoc on my body clock. 3am. 3AM!
High Points.
Holly. S♥lace. Blonde wigs. Thule. Fiona. Vegan truckers. Grace. Trim. Rosabel. Slim-slam glamour girls. Mogits. The Titanic. “Walking out into a night sky, thumb out and fag in hand”. Ferries. Wales. Curry and chips. Araf. The kind of days that pull you out to play. Nameless boys on motorbikes. Miracles. Scenic rout...more
Initial Final Page Thoughts.
Ms Dowd’s books sure do play havoc on my body clock. 3am. 3AM!
High Points.
Holly. S♥lace. Blonde wigs. Thule. Fiona. Vegan truckers. Grace. Trim. Rosabel. Slim-slam glamour girls. Mogits. The Titanic. “Walking out into a night sky, thumb out and fag in hand”. Ferries. Wales. Curry and chips. Araf. The kind of days that pull you out to play. Nameless boys on motorbikes. Miracles. Scenic rout...more
4.5 stars
“I was in the middle of a field in Wales with a storm growling in the sky and the cops after me. And all I had to help was a thieving glamour girl who only existed inside my own cracked head.”Having seen many fall into clichéd or melodramatic territory, I tend to be wary of books with plotlines that centre around a character taking a (literal) journey of self-discovery. The usual formula (teen has issues, teen hits road, teen has quirky interludes, teen has epiphany – all set to a ver...more
This was the first book I read of Siobhan's, and as soon as I finished it all I could think was "I HAVE TO READ MORE!". But then I found out that she'd died of cancer, and had only written four books, and I was sad. She was a true writing talent, and 'Solace' is one of my all-time favourite books.
I love Holly Hogan. Even though self-described 'bad girls' in books get on my wick pretty quickly, you could see Holly's vulnerability and true kind-heartedness a mile away. All she want...more
I love Holly Hogan. Even though self-described 'bad girls' in books get on my wick pretty quickly, you could see Holly's vulnerability and true kind-heartedness a mile away. All she want...more
Holly Hogan is nearly 15 years old and fed up with her life. After spending years in care she is now living with foster parents who she assumes don’t really care for her.
When she finds a blond wig she hides it and on the day before her 15th birthday she puts on the wig, applies some lipstick and runs away.
She’s transformed herself into Solace, a 17 year old beauty with slim-slam hips who knows what she wants and has the courage to go and get it. As Solace, Holly is determined to make h...more
When she finds a blond wig she hides it and on the day before her 15th birthday she puts on the wig, applies some lipstick and runs away.
She’s transformed herself into Solace, a 17 year old beauty with slim-slam hips who knows what she wants and has the courage to go and get it. As Solace, Holly is determined to make h...more
Holly Hogan is no typical sweet 15 year old shes the fierce solace. After spending a few weeks in a new foster home Holly decides to run to Ireland to her mother.Holly knows she wont be able to go to far looking like a 12 year old, so she puts in a blond wig making her 7 years older. She doesn't hesitate leaving her foster patents Fiona and Ray Aldridge whom she hated, they weren't her kind of people she was to wild for them. On the road Holly transforms into solace with her blond wig, she head...more
A blond wigged mysterious girl stows away in the back of a vehicle aboard a ferry headed to Ireland. When she realizes that she is locked in the overheated vehicle in the cargo bowls of the ship, her delirious panic pulls open drawers in her mind that she'd long kept locked. Irish author Siobhan Dowd follows up her well received young adult novel Bog Child, with this rogue road trip tale of loss and personal discovery. 14-yrld Holly Hogan remembers little enough of her childhood before bounci...more
This posthumously published novel of a British author is a tale framed by the event of 15-year-old Holly being locked in the car of a couple she doesn't know who are making the crossing of the Irish Sea from Wales to Ireland. Why and how she is in that car and on that ferry and trying to make that journey is what the book is about. She wants to find her Irish mother, lost to her for almost ten years in the scuffle of a domestic dispute with a good-for-nothing boyfriend. The journey away from her...more
When fourteen-year-old Holly finds out that her caseworker, Miko, at the group home is leaving, she retreats even more into her fantasies about making her way back to Ireland from England and being reunited with her mum who fled an abusive boyfriend, leaving Holly behind.
She reluctantly agrees to try a foster placement since without her caseworker, she doesn’t feel strong ties to the group home, but she resists Fiona and Ray’s middle class life, and kindnesses, and ultimately runs a...more
She reluctantly agrees to try a foster placement since without her caseworker, she doesn’t feel strong ties to the group home, but she resists Fiona and Ray’s middle class life, and kindnesses, and ultimately runs a...more
Fo rmy full review please visit my blog: Solace of the Road review @ From the Shadows I Review
I'm not sure what I want to say about Solace of the road so I'm going to apologise in advance just in case this comes out as a jumbled mess. I found it to be an intense book filled with strong emotions and the words just carried this book along beautifully. I loved the way the story was set out, it felt like you were in a room with Holly and she was telling you her story in an intimate fash...more
I'm not sure what I want to say about Solace of the road so I'm going to apologise in advance just in case this comes out as a jumbled mess. I found it to be an intense book filled with strong emotions and the words just carried this book along beautifully. I loved the way the story was set out, it felt like you were in a room with Holly and she was telling you her story in an intimate fash...more
Memories of Mum are the only thing that make Holly Hogan happy. She hates her foster family with their too-nice ways and their false sympathy. And she hates her life, her stupid school and the way everyone is always on at her. Then she finds the wig, and everything changes. Wearing the long, flowing blonde locks she feels transformed. She's not Holly any more, she's Solace: the girl with the slinkster walk and the super-sharp talk. She's older, more confident - the kind of girl who can walk righ...more
Solace of the Road is a bitter-sweet story about Holly Hogan, a fourteen year old girl who has been living in a residential care home. She has locked away much of her past in her mind and has a very childlike fantastist way of interpreting the world. Many of the things that Holly thinks she wants are false and an illusion. It is her dream of finding her mother and returning to Ireland that spurs her to adopt the role of Solace. Whereas Holly is a girl who is restrained by her life as a care-babe...more
This slim book takes a while to get through due to its slow pacing and lack of action.
Holly/Solace's voice is melodious and well-written, and through all of her reflections, the reader gains a good sense of her character. However, I didn't feel her character matched up well with the plot. She's a very tough-exterior, soft-interior kind of girl, and I felt like she seemed more the type of person who would have settled resentfully into her foster home, maybe gotten into some light trou...more
Holly/Solace's voice is melodious and well-written, and through all of her reflections, the reader gains a good sense of her character. However, I didn't feel her character matched up well with the plot. She's a very tough-exterior, soft-interior kind of girl, and I felt like she seemed more the type of person who would have settled resentfully into her foster home, maybe gotten into some light trou...more
Siobhan Dowd is one of my new favorite authors ("London Eye Mystery" and "Bog Child"). Sadly, her death from breast cancer limits what is available to read by her. I still need to read "A Swift Pure Cry."
"Solace of the Road" is a dark, sad, complex book for patient readers. As with her other books, patience yields great rewards! In "Solace of the Road," 14 year old Holly Hogan is a part of the foster care system. At the beginning of ...more
"Solace of the Road" is a dark, sad, complex book for patient readers. As with her other books, patience yields great rewards! In "Solace of the Road," 14 year old Holly Hogan is a part of the foster care system. At the beginning of ...more
I think that Dowd had an amazing gift in voice and I would have loved to see how she developed the rest of her talents. She did a better job of building characters in this book than she did in Bog Child; Holly was such a nuanced girl - tough but with such innocence, too. Maybe that is a little cliched, but I think its accurate for a lot of kids who have grown up in less ideal circumstances.
One thing that was weird about this book, though, was that sort of spent half of the book waiting fo...more
One thing that was weird about this book, though, was that sort of spent half of the book waiting fo...more
Honestly, I’m not sure how to approach this review. I’m sad because, to my knowledge, this is Siobhan Dowd’s last book. Both Bog Child and Solace of the Road have been published posthumously, and I feel that although I still have a few books of hers to read that were published prior to these two, I am already internally mourning over the loss of such a great writer.
Dowd seems always able to find the perfect balance between telling the character’s story in an engaging way and bringing...more
Dowd seems always able to find the perfect balance between telling the character’s story in an engaging way and bringing...more
Holly is done with it. She is done with social workers and key workers and secure units, she is done with rules and reports, and she is done with her foster parents. She puts on her ash-blonde wig and instantly she's Solace, the mature girl with the slimslam hips and the ability to do anything she wants. She's ready and now she's heading on the road to Ireland, to find her Mom and reunite with her.
The only thing I could do after reading this book was to just set it down and smile in ...more
The only thing I could do after reading this book was to just set it down and smile in ...more
Holly Hogan is 14 year old who has been living in residential care home and now lives in a foster home. She has pretty much locked away what happened in the past, but she daydreams about going to Ireland to find her mother.
One day Holly finds her foster-mum's long blond wig. Putting it on she becomes Solace. A women of the world who makes her own choices, and not the restrained Holly who just does what she's told. Wearing the wig as Solace and with not very much money she hits the ro...more
One day Holly finds her foster-mum's long blond wig. Putting it on she becomes Solace. A women of the world who makes her own choices, and not the restrained Holly who just does what she's told. Wearing the wig as Solace and with not very much money she hits the ro...more
Dowd's character Holly is tough but naive, realistic yet living in a self-created fantasy world, and a child but yet an adult before her time. As the story begins, Holly is desperately trying to escape a locked car traveling on a ferry, and is wearing a wig and going by the alias "Solace." Why Holly has chosen another identity, the reason for her destination, and even the story of the mysterious wig are all told in flashbacks, as she is on the run from her foster family and hitchhiking...more
I've often thought about the idea of somehow being or becoming someone else, to escape moments of my life I've been unhappy with and this book really presents such an idea well.
With problems at home at a young age (the central character is in her teens), it is no wonder Holly wants to be a different person and to find the one person who really matters to her - her mam.
Solace charts the journey upon which Holly embarks upon to improve what she feels is a difficult life, the people she m...more
With problems at home at a young age (the central character is in her teens), it is no wonder Holly wants to be a different person and to find the one person who really matters to her - her mam.
Solace charts the journey upon which Holly embarks upon to improve what she feels is a difficult life, the people she m...more
Holly is an orphan and has lived in Templeton House for the past six years. She gets placed in a home and things are going kind of ok for a bit. She doesn't really have any friends, but she finds a wig that makes her feel like a different person. And she has a room all to herself. But she's confident that her mother is waiting for her in Ireland, where she was born, and can't come get her because she keeps being moved. So when things start to get a little strained in her placement, she runs away...more
highly readable, with a vulnerable 15-year-old as the main character. When Holly runs away from her foster home, she wears a blonde wig and becomes "Solace," a young woman who's confident, older-looking and street-smart, instead of the abandoned teen with romanticized memories of her past. She's on a mission to find her "mam" in Ireland, but the people she meets along the way, and the drawers of her past that open up in her mind, bring her to the realization that her future...more
I've now read two books by Siobhan Dowd, and I feel like her untimely death was such a terrible shame, not least because her writing for young adults is truly excellent. BOG CHILD seemed to come out of nowhere to blow my mind. SOLACE OF THE ROAD follows another sort of lost young person trying to find themselves while coping with a difficult life that sometimes feels intolerable. Holly Hogan is both prickly and sympathetic as a main character, and I was really impressed with how Dowd interwove H...more
I listened to and enjoyed (if you can "enjoy" a painful story) this in the car. Holly/Solace is a very sad girl, but her story is hopeful at the end, which is very welcome. I thought the peeling away of the layers that covered the most painful parts of her life was extremely well done, and she learns to look for her "solace" in a more healthy way. The road is always a good place to do lots of heavy thinking, I guess even when you're hitchhiking. Dowd's last book, and the ...more
Compelling first-person narrative by Holly, who thinks she has given up on herself when she decides to wear her foster mother's discarded wig and become Solace. It's fascinating how Dowd allows readers to see so much that Holly doesn't--for example, Holly says she doesn't like to read and is scornful about being assigned Jane Eyre in school, but she sees parallels between her own situation and Jane's, so that the book has made some impression on her. This kind of awareness means that the book is...more
J'aime beaucoup la collection Scripto de Gallimard, qui nous propose toujours des livres plus variés les uns que les autres, avec des thèmes différents, qui nous fait découvrir tant la richesse de la littérature pour jeunes est vaste.
J'avais déjà été comblée par Le ciel est partout et Lettre à mon ravisseur et c'est donc avec grand plaisir que je me suis plongée dans Où vas-tu, Sunshine ?.
Holly Hogan est comme ce qu'on pourraît appeller une enfant brisée d...more
J'avais déjà été comblée par Le ciel est partout et Lettre à mon ravisseur et c'est donc avec grand plaisir que je me suis plongée dans Où vas-tu, Sunshine ?.
Holly Hogan est comme ce qu'on pourraît appeller une enfant brisée d...more
I read this for my young adult literature class during the Contemporary/Realistic fiction week.
Holly Hogan is in foster care in London, and she misses her biological mother (whom she refers to as "Mam" fiercely. All she wants is to be reunited with her Mam in Ireland. When she finds a blonde wig in her foster parents' house, she puts it on and transforms herself into a girl named "Solace." Solace is fearless and unstoppable, and she decides to run away to Ireland...more
Holly Hogan is in foster care in London, and she misses her biological mother (whom she refers to as "Mam" fiercely. All she wants is to be reunited with her Mam in Ireland. When she finds a blonde wig in her foster parents' house, she puts it on and transforms herself into a girl named "Solace." Solace is fearless and unstoppable, and she decides to run away to Ireland...more
Reviewed by Sally Kruger aka "Readingjunky" for TeensReadToo.com
Life has not been exactly fair to Holly. She has grown up in a series of group and foster homes surrounded by social workers who say they care, but it certainly doesn't feel like they do.
As the story begins, Holly is headed toward a new home. A childless couple arranges for a few test visits and then decide they are willing to offer Holly a place in their lives. It should be the answer to Holly's dr...more
Life has not been exactly fair to Holly. She has grown up in a series of group and foster homes surrounded by social workers who say they care, but it certainly doesn't feel like they do.
As the story begins, Holly is headed toward a new home. A childless couple arranges for a few test visits and then decide they are willing to offer Holly a place in their lives. It should be the answer to Holly's dr...more
'Solace of the Road' was Siobhan Dowd's final young adult novel - a really gifted author, sadly shed died from cancer in 2007.
The book is narrated by Holly, a 14 year old girl living in a residential care home, abandoned by her mother and full of anger towards anyone who shows the faintest bit of interest in her. Holly is given a home by foster parents, but still she wants more and runs away, taking a blonde wig with her. Wearing the blonde wig transforms her into Solac...more
I listened to this as an audio book and loved it. 14 year old Holly Hogan/Solace is on the road. She has run away from her new foster home (London England)and is heading towards Ireland where she thinks her birth mother is waiting for her. On the way she learns a few lessons, meets a few interesting characters and eventually hits rock bottom and then crashes into the roadblock in her mind that has kept her true past hidden. Have a box of kleenex ready for when you get to the end. Highly recommen...more
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Siobhan Dowd was born to Irish parents and brought up in London. She spent much of her youth visiting the family cottage in Aglish, County Waterford and later the family home in Wicklow Town.
She attended a Catholic grammar school in south London and then gained a degree in Classics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University. After a short stint in publishing, she joined the writer's organiza...more
More about Siobhan Dowd...
She attended a Catholic grammar school in south London and then gained a degree in Classics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University. After a short stint in publishing, she joined the writer's organiza...more
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