Covering a massive range of emotional issues in an easy-read, fun, heart-warming tale, this is a pure delight. We start with the death of Brown Owl, Judith, and follow the story of her daughter Lucy and the other Pixies from her Brownies through life-changing experiences and self-discovery. Dealing with sex, alcohol, affairs, weight, suicidal thoughts, babies and ambitions, all life is observed. Each chapter begins with a Brownie saying or just a sentence about how a person should conduct themselves which, as an ex-Brownie, brought the whole experience flooding back, very thought provoking, very nostalgic. I laughed out loud at times and was brought up short with surprise at others, and all in all I loved it hugely.
Shy, sweet-natured Lucy Collins is used to being pushed around. For the first eighteen years of her life, her widowed mother Judith ruled the roost. Now Lucy's husband, her seven-year-old daughter and even Buster the cat boss her about. But her mother's premature death leaves Lucy an orphan at the age of thirty-five. She's devastated...but she's also free. After a lifetime of being a disappointment to everyone, is it finally time Lucy grew up?
As she clears out her mother's rambling house, Lucy discovers a trunk full of memories...her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother were all Brown Owls: capable, no-nonsense matriarchs who were the leading lights of the Girl Guide movement. They spent their spare time preparing the next generation for their roles as wives and mothers with a mixture of campfire songs, sew-on badges and reef knots. But could the old values and frontier spirit now hold the key to help Lucy make the changes she needs in her life?
Kate Harrison trained as a journalist, working for a news agency before moving to the BBC where she was a reporter in regional news in Bristol and Birmingham, a producer on Newsround, and then worked on Panorama and other investigative/consumer shows and documentaries. Kate is the author of eight novels, all of which are published by Orion, including the Secret Shopper series, and, most recently, The Boot Camp. In 2011, Orion Children's Books published the first of her young adult trilogy, Soul Beach. Kate has written for national newspapers and magazines including the Telegraph, Mail on Sunday, Red and Cosmopolitan.
