Review: The Clippie Girls - Margaret Dickinson

Sisters in love. A family at war. A city in peril.
Rose and Myrtle Sylvester look up to their older sister, Peggy. She is the sensible, reliable one in the household of women headed by their grandmother, Grace Booth, and their mother, Mary Sylvester. When war is declared in 1939 they must face the hardships together and huge changes in their lives are inevitable. For Rose, there is the chance to fulfil her dream of becoming a clippie on Sheffield’s trams like Peggy. But for Myrtle, the studious, clever one in the family, war may shatter her ambitions.
When the tram on which Peggy is a conductress is caught in a bomb blast, she bravely helps to rescue her passengers. The shock waves that ripple through the family will affect each and every one of them and life will never be the same again.

My thoughts:

This was a family saga about 3 sisters, their mother and grandmother, in the time of WWII.

The war starts and sisters Peggy and Rose becomes clippies (conductresses). Peggy is the oldest, pretty levelheaded and careful. I liked her and understood why she was not over the heals in love with the man she was going out with. While Rose is the hellion (well almost) and who is in love with her sister's boyfriend. As you can see tension from the start.

Then we have a grandmother who says what she wants and has very firm opinions about things. A mother who stands in her own mother's shadow and the youngest sister who loves to study.

But it's mostly about Peggy and Rose. Their lives during the war as it changes everything. It's a book about friendship, love, family and heartache.

When the book reached a certain point I did not want to put it down. I needed to know what would happen to certain characters and I feared my heart would break.

Conclusion:

A good family saga.

Cover
meh, but at least it shows what it's about

Genre: Women's fiction

Pages: 438

Published: February 14th 2013 by Pan Publishing

Source: For review