An enjoyable book set in current day and at Bletchley Park during WWII. Of the two storylines I felt the WWII one was better, the current day one a bit predictable ( )

I like Erica James...she is 'chick lit' but not as we know it. She's more grown up woman-lit as the stories and characters are settled in life and have lived a little. This novel is no different with two loners who have experienced family tragedy finding love. The added interest centres on Bletchley Park and the war effort. This element was really interesting as often any story featuring Bletchley focuses on the breaking of the Enigma code, or the war in general. This focussed more on the people, and the lives led outside of the Park.

The characters were well developed, the story not too far outside the realms of possibility, and yet not too deep or dry as to make the reader lose interest in what is going on. The flitting between stories is also very well done too. ( )

Saskia has grown up in a house shared by her father and her two grandfathers, after a tragedy that affected them all. Now she repairs old books while her father sells books and evaluates their worth. Saskia finds a notebook cleverly concealed in an old Bible, and becomes engrossed in the tale in its pages of wartime love and romance. She shares her find with the rightful owner of the notebook, and he, too, is soon caught up in the story. Thus begins the tale of the dandelion years. In this well-written novel, the story vacillates from present day to the war years in England. Both story threads are equally compelling and engrossing. Both have delightful characters and intriguing plots. It’s a story that is both heart-wrenching and heart-warming. The duel narration with Emma Gregory and Lee Maxwell in the audio version adds much to its enjoyment. ( )

When Saskia's mother and two grandmothers are killed in a car accident, her father and both grandfathers pool together and buy Ashcombe, a rambling pink cottage on the edge of the Suffolk village of Melbury Green. There they raise 10-year-old Saskia together, journeying through the healing process, rebuilding their lives, and each finding their niche within their new family. Now an adult, Saskia is a book restorer and still lives at Ashcombe. When she discovers a notebook cleverly concealed in an old Bible, Saskia finds herself drawn into a tale of wartime love and loss as she follows the story to Bletchley Park and the codebreakers working there during World War II. A lovely warm-hearted book about love, loss and family. I love those two grandfathers! ( )

After the first few chapters which introduce the characters, the story starts. It's a two-for. And you know how the present-day one will end. But read on anyway. One story in present-day England, the other in England of the 1940s. The 1940s include the war years and I was reminded of the TV-series Bletchley Park and Foyle's War. And glad that I had read Eric Larson's "Dead Wake" about the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915. That book provided background for much of the discussions still prevalent within the Bletchley Park of the 1940s. The portrayal of the granddaughter Saskia is, however, disastrous: she is a woman in her mid-thirties but comes over as a 20s something out of touch with her peers- both the thirties-somethings and the twenty-somethings. Read it and see if you agree. Good story. ( )