Spotlight: The Forsaken Children by Naomi Finley
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Series: The British Home Children, Book 1
Genre: Historical Fiction
A riveting tale of endurance and resilience, illustrating the spirit of a child and the bond between siblings.
It’s 1922. Fifteen-year-old Hazel Winters and her six-year-old brother, William, are placed on a ship by an organization that relocates British orphans and children of poverty to new homes in Canada. Arrivals in the new land are exported to distributing houses, where devastation and heartache greet the youngsters as headmistresses govern their fate.
The assurance of a better life across the ocean is far from what Hazel experiences. Through hardships and loneliness, she is determined to survive. Finding refuge in memories of the past, she clings to the dream of returning to her homeland while preserving a reunion in her heart.
In 1890, orphaned Charlotte Appleton and her sister Ellie were scooped up from London’s streets and sent to new homes across the ocean. Although mere miles kept them apart, Charlotte never knew her sister’s whereabouts until a chance interaction reunites them. Together the siblings vow to make a difference for the families and home children of an institution in Toronto, Ontario.
Can an unexpected guardian give Hazel renewed strength and resolve for a future of promise?
Based on the child emigration movement that occurred from 1869 through the late1930s, this poignant tale follows the lives of siblings who were burdensome byproducts of Britain’s poverty.
Excerpt
I am Hazel Winters. A girl without a home. A burdensome by-product of Britain’s poverty.
The evening meal roiled in my stomach as the vast ocean waves licked the ship carrying me and my six-year-old brother, William, and the other children, toward our new homes.
Weeks prior, hungry, homeless, and without hope, my mum had taken us to the organization that helped Britain’s poor families and street urchins to achieve a better life. The lying rat with red hair, seated behind the desk, had smiled and crowed to another mum about the abundance of possibilities in a faraway land. Many nights, as I’d huddled with my brother and Mum trying to find warmth while my stomach burned and twisted with hunger, I had dreamed of such a place.
Before the war, we had a proper home in London. Although we had never known wealth, we had been happy. After Dad returned from the war as a haunted man and a stranger to us all he had moved us to Liverpool, but it was after his senseless murder that life became even more problematic.
At fifteen years of age, I understood Mum’s struggle to ensure we didn’t end up like the emaciated children whose corpses lay decaying in the alleys of Liverpool. But as Mum had walked down the front steps of the institute, I had an inkling that we’d never see her again.
If she had returned, it wouldn’t have mattered; within days of our arrival, the organization placed my brother and me on a ship with other children headed to receiving homes in Toronto, Ontario.
“’Azel?” William’s sleep-laced voice cracked beside me on our bunk. “We almost there?”
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About the Author
Naomi is an award-winning author living in Northern Alberta. She loves to travel and her suitcase is always on standby awaiting her next adventure. Naomi’s affinity for the Deep South and its history was cultivated during her childhood living in a Tennessee plantation house with six sisters. Her fascination with history and the resiliency of the human spirit to overcome obstacles are major inspirations for her writing and she is passionately devoted to creativity. In addition to writing fiction, her interests include interior design, cooking new recipes, and hosting dinner parties. Naomi is married to her high school sweetheart and she has two teenage children and two dogs named Egypt and Persia.
For more information, please visit Naomi Finley’s website. You can also find her on Facebook, Instagram, and Goodreads.
