This is the 116th book I’ve read by this author (this includes her works as Philippa Carr and as Victoria Holt), and I rank it in the Top 3.

It’s a pity she didn’t write more like this. She’s better at creating her own characters and stories than she is at biographical fiction as far as I’m concerned.

What we have is something that reads like a nineteenth-century classic. It opens in the 1840s, in Cornwall, and to begin with it focuses on two twelve-year-old girls. One, as you might guess, is Lilith. She’s of the poorer class.

The other girl is Amanda, who’s of a higher status, living with her over-religious father and weak-minded mother.

These two opposites meet when the insolent Lilith is given a job in Amanda’s house. After an uneasy start, the two begin a life-long friendship. Lilith is selfish but an affection for Amanda grows as time passes, while Amanda is sweet-natured and cares for those worse off than herself, so it’s not unusual that she should befriend a girl beneath her station.

The novel is divided into three parts, with Part 1 being in Cornwell. A lot goes on here, including secret meetings between lovers, and Amanda’s kind nature is forever overlooked and misunderstood by her father, whose treatment of her is cold to say the least.

The second book sees some of the main characters in London. From here, the years begin to pass much quicker than the Cornwall section. New characters come into the story. They, like everyone already introduced to the reader, are vivid and believable.

Can’t add too much about what happens from this point, as it might reveal spoilers, but I loved the way the main characters’ lives twisted and turned.

In many of this author’s other novels, I predicted certain outcomes with ease, yet in this novel I was surprised again and again.

By Part 3, the years begin to fly by. We get child characters come into the tale, which adds more colour, and through one child a whole new and unexpected plotline develops.

I see one or two other reviewers have commented that they dislike the main character. To me, that’s not too important. I’m more interested in believable characters than likeable ones. Lilith may not be likeable, but she is vivid and memorable. She's the sort of character that any author should be proud of creating. If readers are indifferent, then the author has failed somewhat.

Having said that, I can’t state that I disliked Lilith. She has a charm that balances out her darker side, plus her affections for her brother and Amanda make her more human.

I didn’t like Lilith’s grandmother, but that’s not a bad thing. It’s another instance of the author creating a vivid character.

I loved Amanda, as you might have guessed by now. I also liked Lilith’s brother William, the child characters that appear in the last part of the book, and quite a few others.

I’d no clue how this novel would finish. When the ending came, though, it left me disappointed for the first and only time since I started reading. It’s not that it was bad or unrealistic, or anything along those lines, but I expected something more definite. I can’t elaborate without giving it away, but you’ll understand if you give this fine novel a read.

It’s almost as if the author didn’t know how to end it. It had the potential to continue for another hundred or more pages. It’s a shame she didn’t write a sequel.

Only bad points are the usual Plaidy traits of ‘telling’ instead of ‘showing’, reporting on events instead of dramatizing, etc., yet the story and characters are so strong, these style defects didn’t intrude like they have in so many of her other novels.

In nutshell, while some readers didn’t find ‘Lilith’ to their tastes, for me this was an absorbing read. ( )