Book Review: THE VISITORS BY REBECCA MASCULL

My Thoughts on this beautiful, moving story .........

THE VISITORS

BY

REBECCA MASCULL

Paperback Published:  17 July 2014

Publisher:  Hodder & Stoughton

Imagine if you couldn't see ...
couldn't hear ...
couldn't speak ...

Then one day somebody took your hand and opened up the world to you.

Adeliza Golding is a deaf-blind girl, born in late Victorian England on her father's hop farm.  Unable to interact with her loving family, she exists in a world of darkness and confusion: her only communication is with the ghosts she speaks to in her head, who she has christened The Visitors.  One day she runs out into the fields and a young hop-picker, Lottie, grabs her hand and starts drawing shapes in it.  Finally Liza can communicate.

Her friendship with her teacher and with Lottie's beloved brother, Caleb, leads her from the hop gardens of Kent to the dusty veldt of South Africa and the Boer War, and ultimately to the truth about the Visitors.

Hop-pickers in Kent in the 1900's

This book is beautiful.  I adored this story of Adeliza and how she changed from this 'wild animal kept in a tame house' where the servants found her unsettling and didn't want to be alone with her.

Told by Liza herself, I really felt as if I knew what was going on in her mind, her frustrations, how she hurt herself and the people around her just so she could feel something and be taken out of her dull existence for just a little while.  The writing was incredibly descriptive.

Her life was totally transformed when she met Lottie who gave her life meaning, she gave her hope, a future and. most importantly of all, a wonderful friendship.  I felt very emotional when Liza first learns that shapes make words.

I was totally engrossed and had no idea of how the story would evolve, it was a surprise to be taken from hop-pickers to oyster beds, and then to the midst of the Boer War, but in a good way.

This was a very entertaining read, a unique and inspiring story, a ghost story, a coming of age story, all beautifully told with fantastic imagery.

This is one of my favourite books that I've read this year.

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About the Author:

Rebecca Mascull lives by the sea in the east of England with her partner Simon and their daughter Poppy.  She has previously worked in education and has a Masters in Writing.  The Visitors is her first novel.