What a terrific and powerful book, I reckon it is her best yet. It covers race, adoption, rejection and even murder (or does it?). Our hero, Smitty, a black girl, white adopted parents, white long-term boyfriend, discovers her biological family in Brighton. Naturally there are secrets in the cupboard but you certainly don’t see the details coming. With a jealous and bitchy cousin and a demanding, and frankly most unpleasant ‘birth’ grandmother both making unreasonable requests, this is, as I’ve said, terrific, especially when the final twist hits you in the stomach.
Reviewed by Sarah Broadhurst Sarah Broadhurst spent her early working life in the book trade in both retail and wholesale until the arrival of children forced her to look for freelance work she could do from… More reviews by Sarah Broadhurst
About That Girl from Nowhere
This is an emotional thriller about love, identity and the meaning of family. 'Where are you coming from with that accent of yours? he asks. "Nowhere,' I reply. 'I'm from nowhere.' 'Everyone's from somewhere,' he says. 'Not me,' I reply silently.
This is an emotional thriller about love, identity and the meaning of family. 'Where are you coming from with that accent of yours? he asks. "Nowhere,' I reply. 'I'm from nowhere.' 'Everyone's from somewhere,' he says. 'Not me,' I reply silently.
Clemency Smittson was adopted as a baby and the only connection she has to her birth mother is a cardboard box hand-decorated with butterflies. Now an adult, Clem decides to make a drastic life change and move to Brighton, where she was born. Clem has no idea that while there she'll meet someone who knows all about her butterfly box and what happened to her birth parents.
As the tangled truths about her adoption and childhood start to unravel, a series of shocking events cause Clem to reassess whether the price of having contact with her birth family could be too high to pay...
Dorothy Koomson is an award-winning, global bestselling author whose novels include the Sunday Times bestsellers The Friend, That Girl from Nowhere, The Ice Cream Girls, The Woman He Loved Before, The Chocolate Run and My Best Friend’s Girl. Her books have been translated into more than 30 languages with sales that exceed 2 million copies in the UK alone. Dorothy’s books are powerful, thought-provoking and compelling ‘emotional thrillers’ where moral dilemmas are central and where the complex emotions of family and friendships are explored. Her third book, My Best Friend’s Girl, was selected for the Richard & Judy Summer Reads of 2006, and her novels The Ice Cream Girls and The Rose Petal Beach were both shortlisted for the British Book Awards in 2010 and 2013, respectively. A TV adaptation loosely based on The Ice Cream Girls was first shown on ITV1 in 2013. Her novels have all been Sunday Times Top 10 bestsellers including That Girl from Nowhere, When I Was Invisible, The Friend and Tell Me Your Secret.
Dorothy recently featured on the 2021 Powerlist as one of the most influential Black people in Britain and appeared in GQ Style as a Black British trailblazer. She uses her platform to support new writers and recently launched ‘The Happy Author’ podcast and is a Judge for the 2021 Grazia and Women’s Prize for Fiction First Chapter competition. This year she also contributed to the World Book Night collection, Stories to Make You Smile, to the Feminist Book Society’s This Is How We Come Back Stronger and to a collection of love stories by women of colour, Who’s Loving You.
Passionate about the importance of reading and literacy, Dorothy is a regular speaker in libraries and supports the work of the National Literacy Trust, an independent charity that transforms lives through literacy www.literacytrust.org.uk and Little Green Pigwww.littlegreenpig.org.uk, a Brighton and Hove based charity that offers free writing workshops for young people in need. Dorothy lives in Brighton (well, Hove, actually) and the city is an ever-present character in her novels.
This is an emotional thriller about love, identity and the meaning of family. 'Where are you coming from with that accent of yours? he asks.
That Girl from Nowhere features in the following genres: Family Drama, Books of the Month, Books with reviews by our Reader Review Panel, eBooks of the Month, Romance / Relationship Stories, Sharing Diverse Voices, Fiction, Recommendations
Paperback, Hardback. £8.09, down from the £8.99 cover price. Print on Demand / Special Order.
That Girl from Nowhere was written by Dorothy Koomson and published by Arrow Books Ltd an imprint of Cornerstone
That Girl from Nowhere has 464 pages
£8.09, reduced from £8.99. Print on Demand / Special Order.
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