(Review) Orphan Train

A LOT of times when a book boasts of being a best-seller and an award-winner, it tends to fall short of all the expectations one can have. But Orphan Train, a New York Times best-seller, is every bit as mesmerising and fascinating as it promises.
A tale of two women separated by decades in age but sharing the same childhood isolation and hardship and who find a whole new world together, it is all at once heart-breaking and poignant and believe me, once you begin, you will be hard pressed to put the book down.
Between 1854 and 1929, trains known as orphan trains travel regularly from the cities of the East Coast to the farmlands of the Midwest, carrying thousands of abandoned children to be adopted by loving families - or taken into homes where they face hard labour and servitude.
Vivian Daly, a 91-year-old widow living alone in a mansion on the coast of Maine was one of those children.
Her original name was Niamh Power, an Irish immigrant. Seventeen-year-old Molly Ayer is a Penobscot Indian who has spent her youth in and out of foster homes and more often than not, in trouble.
Now, the only thing that is keeping her out of juvenile hall is 50 hours of community service and she signs on to clean Vivian's attic.
Hidden in a maze of trunks and boxes, are vestiges of a turbulent past and as Molly helps her sort through her possessions, she discovers a sort of kindred spirit.
The book moves to and fro from contemporary Maine where a strange bond and friendship develops between Molly and Vivian, and Depression-era Minnesota where the tale of upheaval and resilience of Vivian's past are revealed.
The two time frames are intricately woven and gels together beautifully, taking the reader into a period of lesser known history and the yearning to belong, for family, for acceptance and the journey to find it all.
Orphan Train