The Little Cottage in Lantern Square by Helen Rolfe was quite a lovely little read, which was a much needed balm to my soul after a previous horror story.
The book starts off a little slow, with the main character Hannah (early thirties, 2 cats) moving from the city into the fictional little village of Butterbury in the Cotswolds, right into a cute little house called Lantern Cottage. She runs her own business from home selling care packages online, a rewarding but also stressful job as she makes sure to send absolutely perfect gifts to the recipients. Her life slowly integrates into the village as she builds up relationships with everyone around her and is very keen to volunteer her time at the local nursing home, to give all she can to her community and become an essential part in it. Everything is very idyllic, there are some quirky and mischievous characters, and Hannah is really building her life up, taking part in as many community events as she can.
Although only hints at the beginning of the story, Hannah's past comes back to disrupt her village life. Her former best friend, Georgia, who she had run a business with previously but ended on less than good terms, seeks to rekindle the closeness they once had. Hannah, believing in second chances, decides to open herself back up again and accepts the apology. Then her ex-boyfriend Luke shows up as well, seemingly with good intentions, and both worm their way back into her life, managing to help her out when she is at her lowest. But the idyll is over; suddenly, mistakes with her business happen that Hannah blames herself for, and in general chaos has found its way back into her daily life. Will she be able to create peace again for herself with those old relationships rekindled?
All the while, Hannah has met the local doctor who seems to have a different woman on his arm at every event, and is unsure how she feels about him. At least the gardener Rhys has landed firmly in the ‘friends’ category, lovingly tending to her garden and anything else green that shows up.
The writing feels a little clumsy at times, with fragments of sentences repeated frequently very close together, but it doesn’t distract too much from the reading experience. I did have a hard time trying to keep track of all the characters, as the reader literally gets introduced to the whole village with names and occupations, and they will pop up again later, luckily often with some kind of context. One thing that stood out to me was that Hannah had made a few female friends her age in Butterbury and was seemingly getting very close to them, but they never made it into any of the important conversations you would have with a trusted friend. Maybe it was just a plot device, I would have preferred the occasional note that ‘she would have loved to discuss this with Cate who was unfortunately too busy with her toddler to sit down for hours and have deep conversations’ over building up a friendship and then giving it no importance.
The book is basically an advertisement for the Woman’s Institute with how often it gets mentioned and how much of an impact it has on the whole story, to the point where I’m almost considering joining them myself if they are really that good of an organisation. I’ve only really been aware of the yarn they sell at Hobbycraft and never looked further into it, but maybe this will give me the push to get to know the local group. Many of the characters seem to be involved with the Institute and it is shown very much as a device that’s there for you when you need it. It’s a very inspiring message, sometimes laid on very thick but nonetheless appreciated.
Altogether, it was a very wholesome and warming story about doing the work to come together as a community, and that while forgiveness is powerful, we should not be naïve to the point of destruction. It has a very whimsy quality but delves into the dark corners of the mind that Hannah had been running away from, and they truly are dark at times, but handled in a light hearted manner. Mental health and grief takes a bit of a spotlight and is touched on respectfully, with empathy and compassion. Hannah’s story is a little bit too idealistic, as not everything can be fixed with a good dose of optimism and some well-timed meddling, but a message of the book seems to be that we ought to at least try. Even the most stone cold gossip could be turned around when the right acquaintance is found, and the perfectionist mother might be capable of admitting her own flaws and being able to tolerate her daughters. It shows us what a world we could create if we were all a little more vulnerable and willing to share our worries without the fear of being judged by those closest to us. There is hope here, a place that will welcome us home when we are ready to be a part of it, to be truly authentically ourselves to us and everyone around us. It's a romance story with a happy ending, but there is also so much more to it, and I'm very glad the little book found me.
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