Oranges and Sunshine

Sep 21, 2024 10:04 AM

Author:Margaret Humphreys

Also published as Empty Cradles.

In 1986 Margaret Humphreys, a Nottingham social worker, investigated a woman's claim that, aged four, she had been put on a boat to Australia by the British government. At first incredulous, Margaret discovered that this was just the tip of an enormous iceberg. Up to 150,000 children, some as young as three years old, had been deported from children's homes in Britain and shipped off to a 'new life' in distant parts of the Empire, right up until as recently as 1970.

Many were told that their parents were dead, and parents often believed that their children had been adopted in Britain. In fact, for many children it was to be a life of horrendous physical and sexual abuse far away from everything they knew. Margaret reveals how she unravelled this shocking secret and how it became her mission to reunite these innocent and unwilling exiles with their families in Britain before it was too late.

Reviews

It is a story that defies belief.

—— Independent

The secrets of the lost children of Britain may never have been revealed if it had not been for [the actions of] Margaret Humphreys.

—— Sunday Times

A modern Florence Nightingale.

—— Sydney Morning Herald

A truly astonishing, haunting, real-life detective story.

—— She (Australia)

Brought tears to my eyes. It is impossible to read...without thinking "These could be my parents. These could be my children."...Despite the sadness and anger at its centre, hope remains the principle message of this remarkable book.

—— Terry Waite , The Times

strange, original

—— Sunday Times

This one really is a song ... It evokes, but it also embodies, its subject

—— Brian Morton , Tablet

a dense, vigorous portrait

—— Maggie Fergusson , Intelligent Life

Manages, in prose both rhapsodic and precise, to convey the allure of the legendary bard from ancient Greece to modern times. This myth has flowered into truth

—— Boyd Tonkin , Independent, Books of the Year

The publication of Pakistan: A Hard Country could not be more timely ... illuminating as well as entertaining

—— The Spectator

With patience and determination, Lieven observes and records all aspects of the curiosity otherwise known as Pakistan ... A sweeping and insightful narrative

—— Mohammed Hanif , The New York Times

Required reading for anyone interested in history ... timely and thrillingly told

—— Literary Review

Superb...Cleopatra led an epic life, and Schiff captures its sweep and scope in a vigorous narrative aimed at the general reader yet firmly anchored in modern scholarship. The author's greatest strengths remain the lucid intelligence and subtle analysis of personality...Schiff reanimates [Cleopatra] as a living, breathing woman: utterly extraordinary, to be sure, but recognizably human.

—— Los Angeles Times

Stacy Schiff draws a portrait worthy of her subject's own wit and learning...Ms. Schiff manages to tell Cleopatra's story with a balance of the tragic and the hilarious...[and] does a rare thing: She gives us a book we'd miss if it didn't exist.

—— Wall Street Journal

Captivating...Ms. Schiff strips away the accretions of myth that have built up around the Egyptian queen and plucks off the imaginative embroiderings of Shakespeare, Shaw and Elizabeth Taylor. In doing so, she gives us a cinematic portrait of a historical figure far more complex and compelling than any fictional creation, and a wide, panning, panoramic picture of her world....Writing with verve and style and wit, Ms. Schiff recreates Cleopatra's lavish courting of Antony (including one dinner in which there was a knee-deep expanse of roses and some of the attendees received not gift baskets but furniture and horses decked out in silver-plated trappings) and his even more extravagant offerings to her (including the library of Pergamum and a host of territories which gave her dominion over Cyprus, portions of Crete and all but two cities of the thriving Phoenician coast). For that matter, Ms. Schiff even manages to make us see afresh famous scenes like Antony's painful death after his defeat at the hands of Octavian, and Cleopatra's subsequent suicide.

—— The New York Times

A swift, sympathetic life of one of history's most maligned and legendary women.

—— Kirkus

Previous Article：MetaMAUS Next Article：Gunpowder

Comments

Welcome to zzdbook comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.