A Field of Bright Poppies

The Grays might be poor, but nowhere in their street of shabby houses would you find a whiter-stoned doorstep, a neater kitchen or fresher linen.

Libby Gray has been sickly since she was a child when, during her enforced spells in bed, she lived in a world of her own, allowing her imagination to take her to lands she could never visit, meet people she could never hope to encounter. When she is offered a job as a nurserymaid for the Ainslie family in the country, Libby’s parents jump at the opportunity to send their daughter away from the smoke-belching chimneys of Ridley Town in Lancashire.

Captain James Randle, a friend of the Ainslies’ elder son Basil, comes to convalesce from terrible wounds received in the trenches in France. And Libby finds her loyalties divided – though she is stepping out with the handsome, flashy Vince, she is drawn to this quiet, well-spoken young man, despite the differences in their backgrounds. And James’s emotions, too, are pulled – between his feelings for Josie, the sensual music-hall girl he has been seeing in London, and for the vulnerable and gentle Libby.