This book is as much about water as about the characters, about the contrast between the summer drought of 1976 and four people bound, ironically, to the element of water so lacking during that long hot summer.
In The Water Children four children are scarred each in a different way in connection with water, through drowning, falling through ice and of water as a refuge from an unbearable present. Naomi, renamed Mara, is the eldest, an orphan raised in terrible deprivation and punishment, coming of age in the Summer of Love, deeply disturbed and desperate for love. Owen bears the weight of a childhood mistake which cost him the affection of his mother, Catherine is unloved by her narcissistic mother and seeks to escape, and Sean feels trapped by his small farm Irish upbringing. All come into each other's orbit in London during the summer of 1975 and the life of a new child - Catherine and Sean's baby Bria - becomes the price of redemption for all four.
But more than that, this is the first fast read I have come across for a while that is beautifully and heart-rendingly written with passages of description that are just wonderful. In some ways, the narrative is quite simple, but it's Berry's talent that makes this book so beautiful
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