Wedding Bells for the Victory Girls

Wedding Bells for the Victory Girls by Joanna Toye

MY REVIEW

(This is the 6^th novel in the Shop Girls series, but can be read perfectly well as a standalone.)

Wedding Bells for the Victory Girls begins its story in June 1945 and features Lily, Gladys and Beryl – three friends who live in Hinton.

We meet Lily Collins (and her mother Dora and older brother Sid) on her wedding day to Jim. They work at work, at Marlows Department Store.

Gladys is married to Bill (now demobbed from the Navy and looking for work) and they have twins Joy and Victor (1).

Beryl runs a bridal wear shop and is married to Les, with their son Bobby (3).

The novel covers their lives with its ups and downs, twists and turns, which I don’t want to tell you too much about, as you should really read this book and discover it for yourselves.

They say not to judge a book by its cover, but this one is stunning – a photographic montage of three young women, with a church and houses behind, the whole thing framed by beautiful pink cherry blossom. It’s really one of the prettiest covers I’ve seen in a long time.

The book itself is equally stunning. It is easy to get into and a comforting read, which only took me two days to finish. It has great characters, ones to love and to hate, yet all authentic and real and popping out the pages to tell you their stories.

I love reading books set in England in this time (1940s) and have read a few recently, but this is the first one I’ve read by this author. In fact, last year, I bought the first book in this series (A Store at War) but hadn’t got round to reading it yet. While I was reading Wedding Bells for the Victory Girls (Book 6), I also ordered Book 2. I really want to read them all, Joanna Toye is such a great author and her words and stories are wonderful.

9 out of 10