Shopkeepers

by Valerie Maskell

For the local merchants and tradespeople, summer in the Edwardian seaside town of Culvergate is a time for business. A time for making the most of the tourist crowds who flock there from the grey terraces of London; a time for ringing up the profits that would see them through another bleak and wind-swept winter.

But from September to May the townsfolk were able to reclaim their lives. As the summer months demanded their professional attention, so the winter made them dwell on the private intrigues of family and friends. For draper, milliner, grocer and picture-framer, winter is a time for delving behind the facade of shop-front finery, where High Street respectability hides darker truths: ambition, rebellion, tyranny and despair.

With a ghostly town and empty shops, scandal and gossip are the new currency for the shopkeepers, as secrets are revealed, hopes are realised and lives are changed...

384 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published June 1, 1995

Reviews

[Sue Chalmers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite an interesting book about people living in the early 1900s and mainly who own and work in shops in a seaside town. It looks at the personalities and lives of the people intertwined with each other and the consequences of living so close.

[Bonnie Staughton · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Shopkeepers" is the tale of the beach town of Culvergate from Summer 1905 to The New Year, 1907. The lives of each shopkeeper and their families and how they interact with the other shopkeepers and families are described. The plight of women is very obvious in each family as appearances and "station" are strictly adhered to. "Shopkeepers" is a picture of what the Edwardian period was like for women. It was an interesting story.