Hope is Daffodil Bright

In 1945 Jean Barnet put her war in a box - all her memories, achievements, and heartache. She hoped it would stay there so that she might forget and become the dutiful wife, mother and daughter a post-war world demanded. Eighteen years later, in 1963, she still hasn't moved on. She knows she must. But in the box is Albert, the gunner she loved and Alice Bragg, the charming socialite who led the Women's Voluntary Service in Cambridge. Will allowing herself to be open to her memories and reinvigorated by the excitement of the wartime years bring Jean the happiness she craves?Hope is Daffodil Bright weaves the historical biography of Lady Alice Bragg, leader of the WVS and Mayor of Cambridge, with the imagined story of Jean Barnet and her family and friends in the village of Grantchester on the outskirts of Cambridge. It tells how the WVS was founded and the multitude of tasks the volunteers took on. It asks timeless questions about remembering, forgiveness, volunteering for the sake of others, censorship and self-censorship. With a vivacious cast of actual and fictitious characters, it asserts that it is never too late to take from the past the happy and the sad and move on to a brighter tomorrow.