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This was almost a great book. I loved the author's ideas about truth and history and how they are not always the same thing. I also loved the premise of a spoiled senator's daughter banished to a small town in West Virginia, as seen largely through the eyes of Willa, the 12 year-old daughter of the host family.
But the characters just didn't work for me. Layla, the spoiled daughter, suddenly morphed into a naive ingenue, Willa's mysterious father never seemed believable to me and her relationship ...more
But the characters just didn't work for me. Layla, the spoiled daughter, suddenly morphed into a naive ingenue, Willa's mysterious father never seemed believable to me and her relationship ...more

This is a very good story that pulls the reader into the lives of residents in a small West Virginia town in the Great Depression. The protagonist is a delightful young girl named Willa, who alternately with her aunt and a female boarder, tells the story of what is happening to their family and their town. There is quite a bit of intrigue involving her father and a long-held secret that eventually is exposed as the story progresses. It is a very good glimpse of what how children view their world
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When a wealthy Senator’s daughter is forced to take the “Pauper’s Pledge” and work for the W.P.A. Writer’s Project in Macedonia, West Virginia, you might expect predictable rubes and hillbillies to populate the story. But, you’d be wrong–way wrong. Just as she brought wartime in the Isle of Guernsey to life, so Annie Barrows now brings small town West Virginia to life. And how!
Layla Beck, daughter of a Delaware senator, has never worked a day in her life. She was “finished” not “educated” and he ...more
Layla Beck, daughter of a Delaware senator, has never worked a day in her life. She was “finished” not “educated” and he ...more

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