Liverpool Lies

by Anne Baker

It is 1941 and Connie and Lottie Brinsley are nurses at Liverpool's Walton Hospital. When heavy bombing is followed by the news that their parents and brother are dead, the sisters are devastated. Then they discover that their uncle, Steve, is not who they thought he was - and it becomes clear that the Brinsleys have been living a life for years.

Genres: Romance, Fiction

448 pages, Paperback

First published May 4, 2000

About the author

Anne Baker trained as a nurse in England, but after her marriage lived in Libya and Nigeria before returning to Birkenhead, where she worked as a health visitor. She now lives with her husband in Merseyside.

Reviews

[Bronwyn Rykiert]

Another great family saga by Anne Baker, this one goes from 1941 to 1947 and is the story of Connie and Lottie Brinsley.

They are training as nurses and living in quarters at the hospital they work at when their home is bombed and their parents and youngest brother are killed. This devastates them but not as much as the secret their mother had kept for over 20 years.

Lottie finds out that who she thought was her Uncle Steve was in actual fact her father. It takes her quite some time to come to terms with this and the secret life that her mother had led, Connie and their younger brother Cliff accept it easier than she does.

It's war time and Lottie wants to join up and do her bit, she rushes into marriage with Waldo Padley while Connie who has been fussy with finding the right man marries Clovis Montague. Lottie goes off to war and when she comes home things are not as she expected them to be.

There are other great people in this book that we see over the years. I love the way Anne writes her stories and this was a good one.

[patricia w wiktorek]

A glance at the past.

WW2 happened when I was a child. Ann's writing brings back so many memories I thought I had forgotten. A good read.

[Mary Stratton]

This one just scraped three stars. Women and WWII is a prolific genre with many very good examples; Liverpool Lies cannot be considered among those. However, it has some pros as well as cons.
The Pros:
• It is set in Liverpool, and the early part of the book takes place during the heavy bombing of that city, which is often overlooked.
• The characters are all imperfect human beings with nontraditional (but in reality, quite common even in the 1940s) family situations. Although they are mostly not particularly likable, Baker manages to present them empathetically.
The Cons:
• Despite the potential and the element of empathy, the characters remain flat. They just to not come fully to life
• The writing, while technically Ok, is also flat and a bit simplistic.
• As the book progresses there is an increase in the repetition of things we already had been told that I found irritating.
Conclusion is that this is not a terrible book for perhaps a rainy day read, but there are many in this genre more worthwhile.

[Jan Chiles]

A nice read

I chose this rating because it was a very simple premise. This was about two sisters who went through the blitz and struggled with tragedy and adversity during WWII and a few years after. It doesn't touch on the patients (they were nurses), or the war itself as much as I would have liked. For 16+

[Catherine Matsubu]

Another good read

Anne Barker consistently provides an entertaining story. I have yet to be bored with one of her books! On to another

[Maura Whelan]

A good read, but I thought the ending finished rather abruptly. Ok otherwise though

[Jennifer]

An excellent book about 2 sisters who went through the war, and pleased that Lottie had the ending that she deserved. A very enjoyable read.

[Heather]

Couldn't put it down. Steve Lancelyn is a goodun!!

[Faye]

I felt the atmosphere and could picture it I recognised some of the places so it was interesting seeing it from a wartime perspective

[Hilaire Pehlert]

Good book

[esh]

Must I really waste my time on this even? I don't even know what to say. It wasn't infuriating, just straight up bad, from the start. I almost dropped it halfway through, but I didn’t hate it as much in the second half. (still hated it but not as much as the first half)

I just had to keep watching the accumulation of nonsense in every characters life.

But on what basis am I giving this a bad rating? The characters? The weird as shit dynamic? The "philosophy" behind the writing of the book, The story? (the writing wasn't bad, per se) Maybe all of that.

Probably one of the most irritating books I've ever read. Baaaad start to the year, I hope Babel doesn't disappoint me.

[Carolanne]

Loved this book.

Anne Baker was born in Birkenhead, Merseyside, England, U.K.