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Sally Carpenter, worried by her husband Fred's suggestion that they should undertake a boating trip on the Norfolk Broads, is reluctantly persuaded, and the couple set off with their bull terrier Bill in their boat, Dogfish Three. Sally was right to be worried: lying in wait for them is a catalogue of disasters that make the holiday a fraught experience. All is redeemed, though, when they are befriended by the boating fraternity and come into contact with 15-year-old Rosie, whose chequered family history quickly has them involved with her problems. The couple decides to help Rosie in her attempts to improve her lot, and then have to come to terms with Rosie falling in love.
In many ways, this is something of a departure for Cookson, with centre stage being claimed by the resilient boating couple Sally and Fred (although Rosie becomes a central character who is realised quite as fully as the older characters), and if the travails of the couple have a striking ring of authenticity, that is no doubt because Cookson utilised her own experience of boating on the Norfolk Broads with her husband Tom to create the background for her charming tale. This time, the suffering that her heroines are usually forced to endure is underplayed in favour of a narrative that makes its effects gently (but as persuasively as one could wish). The eponymous Rosie is a delightful character (as, amusingly, is Bill, the terrier), and the narrative keeps us inexorably turning the pages:
The river had widened and looked bleak and forbidding; posts, black and dripping green slime, reared up out of the rain-spangled water, which no longer appeared like a river: its width spoke of the sea. She went and stood by her husband, and he, taking his eyes from the windscreen, smiled at her. However, she did not return the smile for there, ahead, forever ahead it seemed, were posts.--Barry Forshaw
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. 1st Edition. When Fred Carpenter suggests to his wife, Sally, that they should take a boating holiday on the Norfolk Broads, she is filled with trepidation. Nevertheless she summons her courage and they and their bull-terrier Bill set off, with Fred at the helm of Dogfish Three. Sally's misgivings are soon justified, as a series of disasters, human, nautical and canine, threaten to ruin their holiday. Then everything changes as they make friends with the boating fraternity and encounter the remarkable fifteen-year-old Rosie, whose family history stirs their curiosity and sympathy. As a result, Fred and Sally decide to support Rosie's efforts to better herself - and are rewarded when she finds love and happiness. Seller Inventory # 006063
Book Description Condition: New. New. In shrink wrap. Looks like an interesting title! 0.75. Seller Inventory # Q-0593044908