The Wonder of It All

LoveReading Says

Barbara Taylor Bradford, the doyenne of family dramas and romantic fiction, returns with her fortieth book, The Wonder of it All.

James Falconer has volunteered for the trenches of World War One, leaving his London real estate empire behind. At the Battle of the Somme, he is badly injured and he needs to return home, both to recover and put his life back together. Top of his list is to make amends with his estranged daughter Leonie, to whom he wants to entrust his business, having no other heirs. The novel follows his journey to become a happy man.

This is the third novel in Bradford’s The House of Falconer series, though one does not need to have read the previous two to enjoy this instalment. The family tree included on the first two pages may be helpful to those new to the series.

Bradford, 90, is known both for her sweeping and her prodigious output. She has been published in ninety countries and in forty languages, and ten of her novels have been made into films or television mini-series. This is her fortieth book.

The Wonder of it All is not short on glamorous locations and lifestyles of the rich in 1920s London. Lunches at the Ritz, jewellery from Cartier and suits from Saville Row all feature. Bradford transports the readers there, and it is a lovely place to be. 

Maureen Stapleton

Find This Book In