The Lost Letters of William Woolf

The Lost Letters of William Woolf - Helen Cullen

Description

Lost letters have only one hope for survival . . .

Inside the Dead Letters Depot in East London, William Woolf is one of thirty letter detectives who spend their days solving mysteries. Missing postcodes, illegible handwriting, rain-smudged ink, lost address labels, torn packages, forgotten street names - they are all the culprits of missed birthdays, broken hearts, unheard confessions, pointless accusations, unpaid bills and unanswered prayers.

When William discovers letters addressed simply to 'My Great Love' his work takes on new meaning.

Written by a woman to a soulmate she hasn't met yet, the missives stir William in ways he didn't know were possible. Soon he begins to wonder: Could William be her great love?

William must follow the clues in Winter's letters to solve his most important mystery yet: the human heart.

Review

The idea of this book appealed to me so much that perhaps I let myself think it was going to be a different book than the one I read. I hoped to read people's lost letters, read the tales of them being reunited, and although this indeed did happen in the book - it was for so little time that I like the letters became lost.

I got lost in the mire of the book which seemed to drag on endlessly as it became more a story about the troubled marriage of William, whom I found to be a very lack lustre character. Together with his wife Clare they were a little dull to be honest.

The book is set I would say in the late 1980s but at times it felt more like the 1950s. When in the sorting office I could understand that - as it felt like time had stood still. But once out and about the dialogue reminded me of that from an old black and white movie most of the time, and I kept getting lost as to which era I was meant to be in.

I did finish the book - because I wanted to find along with William "Winter" the writer of the letters he discovers through his work. I was to say the least a little under whelmed by the ending of the book and for that reason and for feeling lost myself through most of the book I'm giving it 3 out of 5 stars.

My thanks to Netgalley for the ARC to review.

Comments

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