The moving story of an evacuee's survival and search for home

Far from the East End

** Saga Magazine 'Life Story' competition winner** 
 
From the streets of London to the Welsh countryside, evacuee Iris Simantel tells of her desperate search for somewhere to belong in Far From the East End. 
 
Born in 1938 under threat of looming war, Iris spent her early years playing in the rubble of bombed buildings in Dagenham by day and cowering in a dusty shelter at night. But the hardships of poverty and the dreaded Blitz could not match the pain she felt at her parents' indifference. She prayed that just once her mother would hold her when the bombs rained down. But loneliness only intensified when she was evacuated. 
 
Finding the nurturing home she had always dreamt of in her adopted Welsh parents, she wonders what, when she returns to London after the war, will be waiting for her. Will she ever be able to love her philandering father, depressive mother and an angry, bullying brother? Will her family even survive? Or will she have to look farther afield for the affection she so longs for? Prepare to be taken on a beautiful and emotional journey with Iris Simantel's nostalgic memoir, Far from the East End. 
 
 
Iris Simantel is the acclaimed winner of the Saga Magazine 'Life Story' competition, telling of her evacuation from Dagenham to Wales, and her family's post-War move to South Oxney. She now lives in Devon.

Iris Jones Simantel grew up in Dagenham and South Oxhey, before moving to the US with her GI husband Bob at the tender age of 18. She now resides in Devon where she enjoys writing as a pastime. Her first memoir about her childhood, Far from the East End, beat several thousand other entries to win the Saga Life Stories Competition.

From the dirty streets of the East End to the Welsh countryside, will little evacuee Iris ever find somewhere to belong? 
 
Born in 1938 under threat of looming war, Iris spent her early years playing in the rubble of bombed buildings in Dagenham by day and cowering in a dusty shelter at night. But the hardships of poverty and the dreaded Blitz could not match the pain she felt at her parents' indifference. She prayed that just once her mother would hold her when the bombs rained down. But loneliness only intensified when she was evacuated. 
 
Finding the nurturing home she had always dreamt of in her adopted Welsh parents, she wonders what, when she returns to London after the war, will be waiting for her. Will she ever be able to love her philandering father, depressive mother and an angry, bullying brother? Will her family even survive? Or will she have to look farther afield for the affection she so longs for?

Iris Jones Simantel

Every girl's dream was to be whisked away by a handsome GI . . . 
 
 Iris Jones had escaped the Blitz but was living in crippling poverty after the war - until a chance meeting changed her life. Aged just sixteen, she fell in love and married US soldier Bob Irvine. And soon after she set sail for a new life in America. 
 
 It was the 1950s and the land of hope, dreams and Doris Day movies. But Iris ended up in a cramped Chicago bungalow with Bob's parents. With a baby on the way and a husband turning daily into a stranger, Iris was wracked by homesickness. Trapped and desperately lonely, she had to make a fresh start, in a country where hope and opportunity thrived. 
 
 In this dramatic sequel to the Sunday Times bestseller Far From the East End, we follow a young girl from London to New York, Chicago and Las Vegas in her struggle to find work, love and a sense of belonging in a foreign land.

Iris Jones Simantel

Books by Iris Jones Simantel

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