Ten Bells Street

The Spitalfieds Sagas #1

by Mary Collins

The East End of London, 1930. Work is scarce, food is in short supply and there is political unrest on the streets. But in the face of all this hardship, there's always friendship.

Becky, Bernie and Rose - three best friends from very different backgrounds - are working hard to establish themselves in pre-war Spitalfields. Becky, the daughter of a Jewish tailor, wants to become a nurse, but her father has more traditional plans for her. Aching to leave the East End and travel the world, Bernie feels trapped by her vast family of poor Irish dock workers. And then there is Rose. Tiny and thin, she lives with her drunken mother and a revolving selection of surrogate fathers who exploit and brutalise them both.

But at least the girls have each other and, as Europe begins to drift towards another war, their friendships become ever more crucial as each one of them fights for their place in an ever-changing, frightening, new world. One way or another, love will pull them through . . .

320 pages, Paperback

Published July 30, 2019

About the author

Mary Collins was born and brought up in the East End of London where her family have lived for generations. A psychology graduate, Mary worked in a psychiatric hospital and in the community until she became a full time writer in 2006. She also writes crime fiction novels under the name Barbara Nadel.

Reviews

[Heather Copping · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is set in the Spitalfields area of London in the years leading up to the second world war. It follows three girls Becky who is Jewish, Bernie who is part of a large Irish family with the men working on the docks and Rose whose mother works the streets and her pimp/boyfriend, who thinks he can treat Rose as his own plaything.
We first meet the girls in 1930 when they are eight and ten years old, then the years progress to 1936 and the era of Mosley and his blackshirts and the Cable Street Riots. As the years go on the lives of the three girls become sometimes more complicated, love affections to Solly who has gone out to Spain to fight, will it come between them or bring them together. Rose seems to fare worse than the others and when she has to visit a woman in a back street, she realises that something has to change.
Life in these times is certainly full of its ups and downs and these families certainly seem to have their fair share of them. The book truly has three very strong female lead characters and although the book finishes almost at the eve of the second world war, I understand that there is to be a follow up book set in the 1940s which will be a must to read, to find out what happens to our three characters and their families. This book will appeal to fans of saga books, but not just female readers, I think the men will enjoy this too, plenty of action and romance to suit all.

[Layla · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kept trying with this book, couldn’t get into it.

[Shreedevi Gurumurty · Rating 4 out of 5]

The East End of London, 1930. Work is scarce, food is in short supply and there is political unrest on the streets. But in the face of all this hardship, there's always friendship.
Becky, Bernie and Rose - three best friends from very different backgrounds - are working hard to establish themselves in pre-war Spitalfields.
Becky, the daughter of a Jewish tailor, wants to become a nurse, but her father has more traditional plans for her.
Aching to leave the East End and travel the world, Bernie feels trapped by her vast family of poor Irish dock workers.
And then there is Rose. Tiny and thin, she lives with her drunken mother and a revolving selection of surrogate fathers who exploit and brutalise them both.
But at least the girls have each other and, as Europe begins to drift towards another war, their friendships become ever more crucial as each one of them fights for their place in an ever-changing, frightening, new world.
Fournier Street,is a street of 18th-century houses in Spitalfields in London's East End.It is in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and runs between Commercial Street and Brick Lane. The street is named after a man of Huguenot extraction, George Fournier.Spitalfields' historic association with the silk industry was established by French Protestant (Huguenot) refugees who settled in the area after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685.
Also located in Fournier Street is the Ten Bells public house. The Ten Bells is notorious for its connection with Jack the Ripper during the 1880s.All 5 victims lived in proximity to the pub.
Following the terminal decline of London's silk weaving industry at the end of the Georgian period, both Fournier Street and Brick Lane became established as the heart of the Jewish East End. A large number of Jews from Eastern Europe and Russia moved to Spitalfields in the 19th century and founded a thriving community.
The International Brigades were military units set up by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War from 1936 until 1938.

[Jeanne Longhurst · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly good read. Can't wait to read the sequal

[emma :) · Rating 3 out of 5]

it was interesting to say the least, but it was cutesy and depressing