The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

I usually love Kate Morton’s books. She is a fabulous author with a great writing style, however I did find this book too long, and felt that it would have been even better with a bit of judicious pruning.

The story is told in three timelines. In the present Cassandra was living with her Grandmother Nell in Australia, when her Grandmother passed away and left her a house in England. Cassandra knew that Nell was a foundling, and decided to come to the UK to research Nell’s story. In the past, Nell starts as a young girl being left on a ship and told to wait and hide, and takes you up to the point where she starts to find out a bit about her past – and then takes her Granddaughter Cassandra to live with her. In the very earliest timeline Eliza was living with her twin brother and mother in poverty in England, when she is found by her Uncle and taken to live with her Aunt and Uncle and cousin, and takes you up to the point when she decides she has to leave the country. 

It's a lovely story, with a clever plot, and beautifully written in her own inimitable style – just too long.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7514361185