Helpful Score: 2
This book captivated me from the first sentence, the first paragraph, Chapter, etc. This was a brand new author for me. I am really not into historical fiction, as they can be dry, but this book was alive! I loved the wild ride. The author knows how to tell a story and not confuse the reader with past and present story lines. This book is well worth the time to read it.
Helpful Score: 2
Really good story, very good weaving two families and many decades together. Aurora is a wonderfully complex character even though she is a child. Highly recommend.
Helpful Score: 2
Enjoyable story, with numerous story lines to keep one's interest. For me, the story fell a bit flat, as though I had read it before and it just tied together a few other novels, with textbook characterization.
Helpful Score: 1
In The Girl on the Cliff, there are many characters, storylines and two different times. However, Riley does an impeccable job of writing and weaving them all together into a seamless story for the reader. It's the stories of Grania and Aurora, who is the girl on the cliff. The two families go way back, spanning almost a hundred years.
Secrets and multiple family dynamics take main stage in this page-turning saga. It's interesting to see how the two families interacted as time moved on and how they react when Grania meets young Aurora. I really liked reading about Grania's past, how she came to meet Aurora. I also enjoyed the letters and whatnot that showed Aurora's family before she and Grania met. It was really something special the way everything came together. Long after the last page was read, I'm still thinking about the story and the characters. Very poignant. Highly recommend!
Secrets and multiple family dynamics take main stage in this page-turning saga. It's interesting to see how the two families interacted as time moved on and how they react when Grania meets young Aurora. I really liked reading about Grania's past, how she came to meet Aurora. I also enjoyed the letters and whatnot that showed Aurora's family before she and Grania met. It was really something special the way everything came together. Long after the last page was read, I'm still thinking about the story and the characters. Very poignant. Highly recommend!
Helpful Score: 1
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the relationship and love that develops between Grania and Aurora in their need for each other.
The story of Grania's and Aurora's families span many years and you are flawlessly taken from present to past, where many secrets evolve. The book is intriguing, even with a sad ending, and I continued to think about it afterward. To me, that's a sign of a good book. Highly recommended
The story of Grania's and Aurora's families span many years and you are flawlessly taken from present to past, where many secrets evolve. The book is intriguing, even with a sad ending, and I continued to think about it afterward. To me, that's a sign of a good book. Highly recommended
This is an intricately woven tale of two Irish families whose lives and fates are intertwined for multiple generations. The dramatic saga is wonderfully written with interesting characters and the lilting sound of Irish speech. Grania Ryan is an Irish sculptor living in New York City who returns back to her homeland after a miscarriage and a breakup with her boyfriend, Matt. The story builds and complicates from that point onward and will keep you guessing what will come next. Really great read!
Boy. Am I glad this wasn't my introduction to Lucinda Riley because I'm pretty sure I would've written her off.
The Girl on the Cliff read like a contractual obligation book and the author tried to make a dollar out of fifteen cents clawing this poor, weak plot together. The storyline is elementary to a fault, all the dots are placed thisclose together and tension is nonexistent. The main characters - Grania, Matt, Mary, Kathleen, Aurora, Alexander - were all dull stick figures that never once felt like real people. The dialogue was bad...I mean, like, really bad. And the ending (once you skim to it) was comedic and laughable at best.
I would not recommend this one to anyone, honestly, there are better ways to spend your reading time. I highly recommend The Lavender Garden for readers new to Lucinda Riley. Definitely skip this if you read above a sophomoric level.
The Girl on the Cliff read like a contractual obligation book and the author tried to make a dollar out of fifteen cents clawing this poor, weak plot together. The storyline is elementary to a fault, all the dots are placed thisclose together and tension is nonexistent. The main characters - Grania, Matt, Mary, Kathleen, Aurora, Alexander - were all dull stick figures that never once felt like real people. The dialogue was bad...I mean, like, really bad. And the ending (once you skim to it) was comedic and laughable at best.
I would not recommend this one to anyone, honestly, there are better ways to spend your reading time. I highly recommend The Lavender Garden for readers new to Lucinda Riley. Definitely skip this if you read above a sophomoric level.
