By the author of Black Narcissus and The River

WITH A FOREWORD BY JACQUELINE WILSON

'A masterpiece of construction and utterly realistically convincing' JACQUELINE WILSON

'Author Godden here tries her deft writing hand at landscaping a child's heart' TIME

'It is a sentimental tale, well told, with an unlikely and entirely satisfactory ending' NEW YORKER

Someone has been digging up the private garden in the Square. Miss Angela Chesney of the Garden Committee is sure that a gang of local boys is to blame, but her sister, Olivia, isn't so sure. She wonders why the neighbourhood children - 'sparrows' she calls them - have to be locked out: don't they have a right to enjoy the garden too?

Nobody has any idea what sends Lovejoy Mason and her few friends in search of 'good garden earth'. Still less do they imagine where their investigation will lead them - to a struggling restaurant, a bombed-out church, and, at the heart of it all, a hidden garden.

'Only Rumer Godden could make a simple tale of a forbidden garden pulse with suspense' NEW YORK HERALD TRIBUNE BOOK REVIEW

* featured on Virago.co.uk

About the Author
Rumer Godden (1907-1998) was the acclaimed author of over sixty works of fiction and non-fiction for adults and children. Born in England, she and her siblings grew up in Narayanganj, India, and she later spent many years living in Kolkata and Kashmir. Several of her novels were made into films, including Black Narcissus, The Greengage Summer and The River, which was filmed by Jean Renoir. She was appointed OBE in 1993.

Reviews
It's a masterpiece of construction and utterly, realistically convincing - though it has a fairytale element too. Rumer Godden's books are admired for many qualities . . . but I think her greatest strength is her accurate, unsentimental portrayal of children. Lovejoy, Tip and Sparkey were so real to me that they have stayed alive in my head for more than fifty years . . . An Episode of Sparrows was the first book that made me cry when I was ten. I cried all over again at this recent reading of the story - and I closed the book with the same sense of total satisfaction -- Jacqueline Wilson * New Spectator *
May well prove the book of the year for those who are not ashamed to weep over the printed page . . . author Godden here tries her deft writing hand at landscaping a child's heart * Time *
It is a sentimental tale, well told, with an unlikely and entirely satisfactory ending * New Yorker *
It would be impossible for a reader not to feel better from reading the story . . . her rich understanding of human nature, her humor and her beautiful prose inevitably leave one aglow * Chicago Tribune *
Extraordinarily gifted writer who manages to infuse her novels with a special magic of their own * Boston Herald *
It has a dizzying cast of characters, radiating out from the inhabitants of a once-genteel London residential square to the residents of the teeming commercial streets beyond * Horn Book *
A gentle, poignant story, poetically conceived with a fairy godmother ending. Recommended for all * Library Journal *



Book Information
ISBN 9781844088515
Author Rumer Godden
Format Paperback
Page Count 288
Imprint Virago Press Ltd
Publisher Little, Brown Book Group
Weight(grams) 196g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 128mm * 19mm