A friendship forged at primary school is still enduring sixty years later. Josie, Lin and Minnie have been through the highs and lows of life together. Now they are reunited with their former teacher who is still trying to impart words of wisdom…
The Silver Ladies Do Lunch is a book about female friendship, seizing every opportunity and a reminder that age is just a number.
The three women have a firm friendship and have been through a lot over the course of their lives. Now in their later years, Josie is grieving for her recently deceased husband, hopeless cook Lin begins to fear for her marriage, and Minnie’s career is nearing retirement and she has no personal life to fall back on. Into this mix returns their inspirational former teacher Miss Hamilton, now in her nineties and still trying to positively influence her pupils.
There is a wonderful warmth to this book. There are a whole range of quirky peripheral characters, some also going back to the women’s school days. The village setting, characters and minutiae of interactions are described effectively to bring the plot to life.
I loved the main three friends and their delightful teacher. They have plenty to offer to the world despite their ages and the enduring love and friendship is uplifting. However, all of the women face challenges in their personal lives and this adds an extra emotional dynamic as they look to the future.
The Silver Ladies Do Lunch is a hugely enjoyable, uplifting novel that will leave you with a warm glow.
The Silver Ladies Do Lunch
When Lin, Josie and Minnie left Miss Hamilton’s class at Middleton Ferris County Primary School, sixty years ago, they could only dream about what the future had in store for them. The one thing they knew for certain was that their friendship would thrive.
Years later and life hasn’t always been kind. Josie is still mourning the loss of her beloved husband Harry a year after his sudden demise. Lin is hoping to celebrate her fiftieth wedding anniversary with husband Neil, but he’s suddenly keeping secrets and telling her lies, so she’s suspecting the worst And as for Minnie, well she loves her life in Oxford academia, but with no family to call her own, she sometimes wonders if the sacrifices were all worthwhile.
So, when the ninety-year-old Miss Hamilton – or Cecily as she lets them call her now – glides gracefully back into their lives on her glamorous purple mobility scooter, the ladies are in need of inspiration and fun. And over their regular lunches, the friends start to dream of leaving the past in the past and embracing the future, because there’s nothing you can’t achieve with good friends at your side.
Judy Leigh is the USA Today bestselling author of The Old Girls’ Network and Five French Hens and the doyenne of the ‘it’s never too late’ genre of women’s fiction. She has lived all over the UK from Liverpool to Cornwall, but currently resides in Somerset.
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