Pineapple — Jill Marshall

PINEAPPLE. A warm, engaging and unique story for the WW1 commemoration, told with sensitivity, bitter-sweet humour and authenticity by Jill Marshall, best-selling author of the Jane Blonde series for girls. When the lives and stories of three people interconnect one summer at Hadleigh Hall in Cornwall's majestic landscape, history ripples as if a stone has been dropped in Hadleigh's famous lily pond. Poppy Moss doesn't want to be there at all, but it's the summer holidays, the folks are out, and with her recent past biting at her ankles, she's not going to be left on her own - even if she'd prefer it that way. Tariq is quite happy to be at Hadleigh. For one, he actually enjoys the art, and the tennis, and meeting some of the people around him. Well, one, anyway. Moreover, he's got a puzzle to solve and a long-held promise to keep. Then there's Robbie, perfectly content with his work in the green and gorgeous gardens, tending to his precious plants and watching the goings on up at the big house from a safe distance. All three lives are about to change forever, in ways that nobody could have foreseen. With paths winding across past and present, through love and war, something simple and bitter-sweet shows just how complex life can be. From Jill Marshall's YA collection.