The love child : a novel

Summary: In this wonderful, richly plotted novel, Catherine Cookson, one of the world's most beloved storytellers, captures the imagination in the tale of a family of outcasts as they triumph over the narrow-minded community in which they live, and of one woman's enduring spirit and heart-warming romance. Set in Catherine Cookson's native northern England in the nineteenth century, this saga tells of the love between Nathaniel Martell and Maria Dagshaw. Together they have six children, and to all appearances they are a caring and proud family. But Maria and Nathaniel never married, and as a result their children are scorned and treated as outcasts by their fellow townspeople. The family perseveres in spite of this difficult existence, but the commitment to surmount the stigma of illegitimacy is strongest in Anna, the eldest daughter. As Anna enters womanhood, she is determined to overcome the legacy of her birth and the challenges it continually brings her. Having spurned all romantic involvements for fear that she will be subjected to innuendo and merciless ridicule, Anna finally meets and falls deeply in love with Timothy Barrington, a wealthy and little-understood man whose pain and hardship match her own.