An Independent Heart

(...)Grant’s story is impeccably researched, from the ice-floes on the Thames where Claire and Justin first meet, to the arguments around the enclosure of common land, to the music Claire decides to play. This is an entrancing novel with a most distinctive voice.

(...)The story moves fast and the writing is fine, witty dialogues and some really beautiful descriptive passages. There’s a bunch of little sisters who are rather fun, a tragic lovelorn cousin, a wise Spanish batman. The hero is both gentle and tough, and while the heroine comes across as aloof and cool (just look at the cover), I liked her a lot in the end, and even went back to the early chapters to search for clues to her character that I’d missed.