Stormswift
by Peter O'Donnell
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Description
The year is 1897. Deep in the mountain wilderness of the Hindu Kush, a seventeen year-old English girl is brought to the primitive tribal kingdom of Shul to be sold as a slave. Her ordeal endures for two long years before at last there comes the chance of escape to Lalla, as she is called, who believes herself to be Jemimah Lawley, heiress to the great house and estates of Witchwood in the county of Surrey. On the hazardous journey of escape across Afghanistan with a man who hates her, she show more hears for the first time a name that will later echo menacingly in her life... the name Stormswift. Once home, she faces the shock of being compelled to doubt her own identity. Is she truly Jemimah Lawley, or is she suffering from a delusion caused by her degrading ordeal as Lalla of Shul? Soon she is plunged into a new world, where she finds there are others who, like herself, are perhaps not what they seem to be. Life in England brings her strange adventures and a touching friendship, but also the heartbreak of love without hope. In these pages Madeleine Brent has woven a tale of many surprises as mystery after mystery unfolds, but strangest of all is the mystery which causes Lalla of Shul to return to the barbaric land of her captivity, there to encounter the dark shadows of death and disaster before she at last finds the happiness she believed could never be hers. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
This novel is a little different from Brent's other novels. Usually, the girl starts out poor, then discovers she's from a family with money or something similar. In this case, she starts out wealthy, but loses it when she realizes someone stole her identity while she was held captive in Afghanistan.
I really like how Lalla/Mim has to figure out how to survive. And I like that the romance was unexpected.
Great book!
I really like how Lalla/Mim has to figure out how to survive. And I like that the romance was unexpected.
Great book!
Yep, it's a Gothic romance!
The secret behind "Stormswift" was frankly disappointing, and reminded me of du Maurier's Rebecca.
I was surprised by the ending.
The secret behind "Stormswift" was frankly disappointing, and reminded me of du Maurier's Rebecca.
I was surprised by the ending.
Page-turner
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Author Information
352+ Works 7,831 Members
Peter O'Donnell was born in London on April 11, 1920. During World War II, he served in a signal regiment in the British Army, assigned to France, Persia (now Iran), Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Italy and Greece. He began drawing comic strips for children as a teenager, and after the war he wrote a number of different strips including Dr. No, show more Garth, and Romeo Brown on a freelance basis. He created the Modesty Blaise comic strip, which was published in The London Evening Standard from 1963 to 2001. During his lifetime, he wrote more than 20 Modesty Blaise novels including Sabre-Tooth, A Taste for Death and The Night of the Morningstar, two short stories collections, and a play entitled Mr. Fothergill's Murder. He wrote a series of 19th-century romance novels under the pseudonym Madeleine Brent. He also wrote for television, film, women's magazines and children's papers. He died on May 3, 2010 at the age of 90. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Some Editions
Work Relationships
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Stormswift
- Original title
- Stormswift
- Original publication date
- 1984-10-18
- People/Characters
- Jemimah Lawley (Lalla); Kassim
- Important places
- Afghanistan; England, UK
- First words
- Soon after dawn on a day in early spring I woke from a dream of the life I had once known.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)The westering sun at my back was still warm, the arm about me was strong, the future unknown but agleam with promise, and I knew a thankfulness and a sense of completion beyond all words as we moved on together.
- Blurbers
- Holt, Victoria; Whitney, Phyllis A.
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Statistics
- Members
- 179
- Popularity
- 182,840
- Reviews
- 3
- Rating
- (3.78)
- Languages
- 7 — Dutch, English, Finnish, German, Hungarian, Spanish, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 18
- ASINs
- 5
