Our first Young Adult novel has had a range of very good reviews.

One of the most pleasing was from Kirkus – the prestigious website based in New York which welcomed a ‘heart-wrenching and beautiful story’.

Myself and Laura Meloni Bywaters, the writers behind SL Roman, created a lot of lively female characters and Kirkus described the story as ‘A vivid chronicle of the lives of girls and women during World War 2’.

Tripti Kandari writing for Feathered Quill, identified our heroine Annie as ‘an endearing main character … a strong likeable protagonist’.

Jason Street for Good Reads & Reed recommended One Year One Night to ‘lovers of short love stories’.                                                                                        

Nancy Bansal for Online Book Club opined

‘The writing is exquisite; each character is portrayed with finesse, and those sketches are an added delight for me’.

And Thomas Andersen in The Literary Titan also liked our range of fictional personalities:

‘The characterisation is top-notch, and the storyline is amazing, straight to the point, and kept me engaged throughout without being overwhelming’.

Those were the reviews from the international literary commentators but we also received rosy reviews from British readers.

Professor Tim Crook supported the idea of our historical fiction being read in schools.

‘It is educational as well as entertaining with its high quality characterisation and drama. I think it should be in every UK school library; particularly in the year (2025) which will be commemorating 80 years since the end of the 1939-45 conflict’.

Other reviewers saw the comparison with the memorable Dad’s Army sitcom on UK TV which satirised the older men who made up the Home Guard in wartime Britain.

Another US reviewer thought the same,

‘Overall, an excellent and highly entertaining read, especially for someone like me who enjoys such things as Dad’s Army and All creatures Great and Small’.

And another US-based reader liked the tone,

‘An enjoyable tale of life through the eyes of a 16 year old girl, set during in a rural village during the Second World War. I’m not a fast reader, yet I finished this in a day. It’s just so easy to read, when the narrator makes me feel like a personal friend’.

So to sum it up, our first collaboration really appealed to readers and is certainly a ‘succes d’estime’ to borrow from the French.

It’s all encouraging for our work as writers as we work on our second novel, with some of the same lively characters seen in One Year One Night by SL Roman.

Note to editor. SL Roman is the pen-name of Sarah Onions and Laura Meloni Bywaters who both live in the borough of Kingston in SW London. Sarah was born in Brighton in southern England and Laura was born in Rome.

Now on sale everywhere: in the UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Year-Night-S-L-Roman/dp/B09GZPYRJ4 and in the US: https://www.amazon.com/One-Year-Night-2nd/dp/194715981X.

Also, at Barnes and Noble in North America. And in Surbiton, SW London at The Regency bookshop.