The Secrets of Rochester Place
Corinne is a present-day emergency call handler who is phoned by a woman named Mary, who says a girl is buried in rubble after an explosion at a house called Rochester Place in Tooting, south London. When ambulance crews arrive, they find the house does not exist. The call is put down as a hoax, but Corinne is not so sure. Intrigued, she starts investigating and uncovers a secret family history which envelops her own. The story is written from the point of view of Corinne; Mary, who travelled to London from Ireland in the 1920s; and Teresa, a young Basque girl who escaped the 1937 Guernica bombing.
It’s a poignant story of migration, racism, love, and mystery. While the times and characters change, the one constant is Rochester Place and the secrets behind its doors. Costello ties up the interconnecting stories neatly, and there is a clever plot twist at the end. She writes with passion about the migrant experience, bringing many cultures and customs to life and intertwining them with tales and myths that have been handed down through the generations. A good, gradually unwinding historical puzzle to curl up with on winter evenings.
