Eva Moves the Furniture

Mother dies in childbirth. Child feels alone. Outcast. Boom. Other world ghosts defend her from bullies, a sexual attack, and a bombing in WW2 London?

It's out there, but Margot Livesey makes it work in Eva Moves the Furniture.

Eva McEwen is the coming of age heroine in this novel of the real and the unreal. When her mother dies after giving birth, Eva's dad, broken by his young wife's death, and her mother's aunt raise Eva on a farm in Troon, Scotland.

One afternoon, two strangers show up in the McEwen's garden, a child of about eight and a woman. Over the years, the two, who can only been seen by Eva, make appearances in Eva's life --- their deeds, at first, seem helpful -- they clean her room or get the eggs -- then ambiguous -- the young girl throws rocks at a local girl who asked Eva over for tea. Eva, desperate for friends, is not sure she understands these mysterious beings' intentions toward her at all.

Are they protectors of her or imps of evil?

Never far from her, the companions, as Eva refers to them, even travel to Glasgow, where Eva trains to be a nurse, whose timely choice leads her to tending to the many injured soldiers of WW2. In Glasgow, Eva meets a surgeon, talented in the new medicine of plastic surgery, with whom she falls in love.

The story of Eva is a story of loss, rescue, and recovery.... Livesey writes flawlessy as she lets the reader uncover the fine line between the magic and the real and the living and the dead.

ETA: This is my second Livesey novel -- the first was The House on Fortune Street. Add her to your reading list. :)