The Girl Who Came Home

The Girl Who Came Home

by Hazel Gaynor

Genre: Historical fiction

Synopsis:  A voyage across the ocean becomes the odyssey of a lifetime for a young Irish woman. . . .

Ireland, 1912 . . .

Fourteen members of a small village set sail on RMS Titanic, hoping to find a better life in America. For seventeen-year-old Maggie Murphy, the journey is bittersweet. Though her future lies in an unknown new place, her heart remains in Ireland with Séamus, the sweetheart she left behind. When disaster strikes, Maggie is one of the few passengers in steerage to survive. Waking up alone in a New York hospital, she vows never to speak of the terror and panic of that fateful night again.

Chicago, 1982 . . .

Adrift after the death of her father, Grace Butler struggles to decide what comes next. When her great-grandmother Maggie shares the painful secret about the Titanic that she's harbored for almost a lifetime, the revelation gives Grace new direction—and leads both her and Maggie to unexpected reunions with those they thought lost long ago.

Inspired by true events, The Girl Who Came Home poignantly blends fact and fiction to explore the Titanic tragedy's impact and its lasting repercussions on survivors and their descendants.

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Review:  I listened to the audiobook version of this story and it was not the right choice to listen to as I drove to and from work as it made me cry on many occasions!  Nothing like showing up to work with a tear streaked face!  The heartbreak in this story was palpable.  The story is told in alternating perspectives and the story bounces around in time a bit.  Most of the time we hear either Maggie's or Grace's perspectives.  Grace is often looking back at Maggie's story in the form of her diary.  The modern story of Grace and what happens in her life was not deep and did not add much to the story except to discover Maggie's story and bring it out into the open.  The story of what happened on the Titanic was not extremely original.  At times I was reminded of the movie Titanic as I listened to what was happening in the story.  That being said, I still truly enjoyed the book and would recommend it to people who like historical fiction.

Rating: 4 stars