Valley of the Moon by Melanie Gideon

Time travel - this time not going very far. Just early twentieth century but still different.

This was so fabulous that I felt that welll..... it could happen you know!!! told so beautifully that the story draws you in and keeps you first in the early twentieth century on a farm/commune. Old fashioned, hard working and gorgeous called Greengage Farm and then swings you out into the harsh world of a single mum trying to bring up a mixed race kid facing all the problems you could imagine. Emotional, financial and with no family trying her very best to cope with a bad situation.

Lux has to try to balance her worlds and without entrusting her secret to anyone but her friend who just does not believe her but is open enough to just accept it for what it is. Lux disappears regularly and no one knows where till one day it goes wrong in a juxtaposition of time and she is away for a year, during which her parents have been given custody of her beloved son. To win him back Lux has to work very hard especially to win his trust and the trust of her parents because she cannot tell anyone where she has been.

Fast forward and Lux living in both worlds continues till she has to make a decision once again with the added complication of another child. What is good for this second child is definitely not the present world and how does Lux try to solve this Solomon like problem.

The story kept me enraptured, and though with its ups and downs emotionally it was a beautifully told one.

Sent to me by Netgalley courtesy of Random House Publishing Group Ballantine, for an unbiased review.