The flight of Gemma Hardy : a novel
(Book)

Overcoming a life of hardship and loneliness, Gemma Hardy, a brilliant and determined young woman, accepts a position as an au pair on the remote Orkney Islands where she faces her biggest challenge yet.

When her widower father drowns at sea, ten-year-old Gemma Hardy, an only child, is taken from her native Iceland to Scotland, to live with her uncle's family. But the death of her doting guardian soon after leaves Gemma under the resentful eye of her aunt, and Gemma, her aunt quickly makes clear, is an unwelcome guest. When she receives a scholarship to a private school, Gemma believes she's found the perfect solution, and she eagerly sets out again to a new home; but at Claypoole she finds herself treated as an unpaid servant. To Gemma's delight, the school finally goes bankrupt in 1959 and she takes a job as an au pair to the niece of a rich, single bachelor on the Orkney Islands.