The Chilbury Ladies' Choir

It’s 1940 and most of the men in the village of Chilbury have gone to war and so the local choir will be disbanded, but not if music teacher Prim Trent has anything to do with it and she persuades the vicar to let a group of ladies carry on.
 
The choir is almost secondary to the various subterfuges and romances of the local residents, some of whom are up to no good while others hide their lights under bushels. Told in the form of letters, diaries or journals it has a mix of humour and seriousness. As with so many novels written from many viewpoints or in an epistolary style there are always some passages that work better than others, plus the inevitable credibility problems with swathes of description and fictional dialogue in letters that would never normally appear in such writing.
 
The dodgy midwife Edwina’s absurd baby-plotting antics in particular feel like part of a comedic “Agatha Raisin” cosy-crime plot while the journal entries of the lonely widowed Mrs Tilling, whose only son has gone to war, offer a much deeper and reflective style. The two sisters, Kitty and Venetia, are inconsistent. Kitty has adult perceptions that the average thirteen-year-old girl in 1940 was unlikely to have and the flighty Venetia’s transformation from irresponsibility and flirtatiousness to a more serious mien in a matter of days is implausible. Other characters are clichéd fare so often found in twee novels set in English counties such as a mysterious Cary Grant look-a-alike, the upper-class Mrs B who finds fault with everything yet becomes a stalwart, the rigid and sadistic Brigadier, the sneaky maid Elsie, plus a range of young “hooray Henry” chaps off to war (including one called Henry). The major tragedy that hits the village is another contrivance to ensure that certain characters are eliminated in order that all ends well for others.
 
The earlier cover with its genuine 1940s flavour is what drew me to this book initially whereas the second version is trendy and perhaps more fitting for a book about World War II written from a modern viewpoint.
 
If you don’t worry about flaws and just want an enjoyable read, then this will fit the bill. 3.5 stars.