Available in bookstores nationwide.
I’ll confess. I’m not really a pensive chick-lit fan. I love my trashy beach reads – sex and shopping is a great palate cleanser between great classical works and thrillers and memoirs; but those slightly drippy, overly emotional female-focused books that always seems to feature only part of a woman on a cover, usually her feet, with the background out of focus, often dropping something (why is that?) just aren’t my bag.
Guess what the cover of That Girl from Nowhere is?!
BUT having never read Dorothy Koomson, and being game for most things, I gave it a go, and I really enjoyed this book.
The story of an adopted woman of colour into a white British family, and her quest for a genetic identity, whatever that meant, was utterly absorbing. I couldn’t put this down! I was desperate to follow Clemency’s story as she negotiated the tricky path of reconnecting with her birth family while trying to reassure her own family that they were still her real family.
The question of belonging is something that everyone wrestles with; but when the colour of your skin is the polar opposite to those you share a name with, that question seems so much more profound, with consequences a lot further reaching than for those who look alike.
Well written with rich characterization and beautiful detail, That Girl from Nowhere is the ultimate reminder not to judge a book by its cover.
by Sarah McMullan @sarahmcmullannz
That Girl from Nowhere
by Dorothy Koomson
Published by Century
ISBN 9781780893358
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