The Road Home by Rose Tremain

Last December, a woman came into the Post Office and handed me this book to read, or to pass on to somebody else. It was for World Book Night 2013.

Seven months later and I've now read it after being informed it had an unexpected ending, which naturally whet my appetite.

What I love about this book is it reminded me how to tell a story and how to build a story using little succinct bits of research to add credibility to the plot and believability to the characters.

Lev is a lost, lonely soul on his way from Eastern Europe to Britain looking for work. It's the story of many people that come into the Post Office to send moneygrams to their families back home. I often think about the backstories of these people. I wonder why they're here and who their family is. Has it been easy for them to make a life and living in our country? Do they miss their home? Do they have crazy friends like Lev has Rudi? 

This is a "real" story and what I mean by that is, there are no happy endings, no easy solutions, no nicely rounding it all off. On the flip side, there are no dramatic, crazy, unbelievable parts either. It's REAL storytelling taking us on a soul searching mission with Lev.      

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