It’s 1955, and Christine is 15. She’s got ambition and she’s got dreams, but her mother has undermined her all her life. Christine knows nothing about the world of sophisticated hair salons, but that’s where she wants to be, more than anything. In Violet Eyes we meet her going for her first interview. She’s soaking wet and there are holes in her stockings. She gets there late. Right from the start, Christine is in jeopardy. It’s a fiercely competitive world, and she’s spotted and exploited for her looks and her enthusiasm. But whatever that world throws at her – and so much happens in this book – she picks herself up and moves on. She doesn’t always get what she wants, but she takes risks and she’s fully alive. Elaine Ramsay skilfully reveals Christine’s progress through the relationships and friendships she makes; there’s a big cast of colourful and memorable characters. Violet Eyes shows us Christine’s life as a young woman, and as she’s aging in 2012. In these chapters she’s not looking back at everything; there are still discoveries to be made, truths to be told and a life to live. There’s sadness, humour and drama, together with a lot of love, lost and found. This book shows life in the fifties and sixties, but there are so many parallels with becoming an adult now. Violet Eyes is a great read, full of action and people who stay in the mind. Elaine Ramsay is an accomplished story-teller, and this book is well worth the read.

It is 1955 and fifteen-year-old Christine, sitting on a commuter train on her way to an interview for an apprenticeship in a Central London hairdressing salon, possesses the innocence both of her age, and of the times into which she has been born. But the Swinging Sixties are just around the corner and everything is about to change. The reader watches in helpless fascination as Christine struggles to understand the behaviour of those around her, and to find a path for herself through the new world being born all around her. Elaine Ramsay succeeds in summoning up London in the early sixties with all its glamour and tawdriness. Her characters feel authentic and recognisable. It’s a thoroughly absorbing read.