Margot Livesey’s latest novel The Road from Belhaven is an enchanting coming-of-age story about a young woman, Lizzie Craig, with second sight. It is, we soon learn, a dubious gift she’s inherited.
When Lizzie Craig was a little girl growing up in the care of her grandparents on Belhaven Farm in late-nineteenth-century Scotland, she discovers that she can look into the future.
She has moments when she sees what she calls “pictures” in her mind's eye. Some of the visions are ordinary, and others are of a more serious nature involving dramatic situations–accidents and worse.
She soon discovers that she might get small glimpses into the future, but she can’t change what will happen–even in spite of her best efforts.
Years later as a young woman, another thing she can’t change is what she feels for Louis Hunter, a young man who courts her and convinces her to move to Glasgow–the big city that represents freedom for her from the farm, but not necessarily opportunities. And there are limits to Louis Hunter’s devotion to her she soon learns.
And there are more dramatic events related to his treachery. What can Lizzie do? Can her second sight finally allow her a second chance to rectify the things she has broken and surrendered for what she thought was love and a bright future?
