It’s great to discover a new saga author and Mollie Walton should be flying high today with her debut The Daughters of Ironbridge. Walton takes us deep into the dark heart of the industrial landscape, setting her story in the iron making towns of Shropshire.
The Daughters of Ironbridge is the tale of two young young girls born in the same month of the same year and yet their lives are worlds apart. Annie Woodvine’s father works in the furnaces owned by the King family and has done so for as long as she can remember. But Annie is bright and intelligent, and she has big dreams. So, when she is asked to run messages for the wealthy King family, she grabs the opportunity with both hands, seeing it as a way out of the drudgery that would otherwise befall her.
Margaret King is surrounded by privilege and wealth. But behind closed doors, nothing is what it seems. When Anny arrives, Margaret finds her first ally and friend. Together they plan to change their lives. But can friendship exist across the divide?
As disaster looms over the ironworks, Margaret and Anny find themselves surrounded by secrets and betrayal. Can they hold true to each other and overcome their fate? Or are they destined to repeat the mistakes of the past?
Walton’s descriptions of both character and setting are vivid. The main characters are well drawn and the tentative relationship between the two girls deftly handled and therefore believable. That said, the supporting characters are both a delight and a horror – there are plenty of antagonists for the girls to fight against and readers are sure to hear more from them in the books to follow.
The Shropshire countryside is a place of stark contrasts, the bucolic beauty of the woodland a sharp relief to the brutal darkness of the furnace, which echoes throughout the plot and its many twists and turns.
The Daughters of Ironbridge is the first in a trilogy and book one ended leaving me impatient for the next one in the series. The story will appeal to readers of Rosie Goodwin and Dilly Court.
‘The Daughters of Ironbridge has that compulsive, page-turning quality, irresistible characters the reader gets hugely invested in, and Walton has created a brilliantly alive, vivid and breathing world in Ironbridge’ – Louisa Treger
Mollie Walton has always been fascinated by history and on a trip to Shropshire, while gazing down from the iron bridge, found the inspiration for what has become her debut saga novel, part of a trilogy titled THE IRONBRIDGE SAGA, published by Bonnier Zaffre.