In my view, the earlier section could do with judicious pruning. Then, suddenly, all that disappears and a different story begins when Opal walks, trembling, through the gates of the sweet factory. This is a long book, 520 pages, and, for the first 140 pages, the main characters are Opal’s beloved, if hopeless, father her best friend Olivia and Opal’s struggles at school. Then Opal meets Mrs Roberts’ son, Morgan, who, she feels is her soulmate. Furthermore, she takes her to a suffragette meeting and invites her back to tea. Her life becomes utterly miserable.įortunately, Mrs Roberts discovers Opal’s artistic talent and gives her a more interesting job decorating sweet tins. Her father, an overworked clerk with literary aspirations, is caught forging a cheque and ends up in prison Olivia is forbidden to see her and Opal must leave school and go to work at Mrs Roberts’ sweet factory, ‘Fairy Glen’, where she’s bullied. She copes with not fitting in at school (she’s plump and shabbily dressed) because her best friend, Olivia, is on her side. She hopes to go to university, though her real love is painting. Fourteen-year-old Opal Plumstead is a scholarship girl at a posh school.
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