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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
3.5 Audio narration is very good. I appreciated the ambivalence of the characters drawn, how decisions and indecision are driven more often by circumstance than a moral compass. At the moment, I feel like the end was too tidy, which is a pet peeve of mine.
There’s unnecessary sex in this book. Nothing graphic or detail, it just says it happens a lot. Which is meh. But I think it’s a very sentimental book. I liked following all the characters. The ending is kinda lame though.
This was my first book on tape experience and I think I prefer reading to listening but definitely enjoyable for a 17 hour drive. The narrating got on my nerves with the accents but it was a new take on nazi Germany. Very good.
Not my favorite of the historical fiction featuring women genre, but enjoyable enough. It ambitiously covers over 60 years of the lives of war widows, but at times sacrifices breadth for depth, I think.
The Women in the Castle was a unique look at WWII and the aftermath, featuring widows of the resistance. I enjoyed this latest addition in my quest to devour as many WWII books as possible and found it to be eloquent for such a difficult topic.
An old and decrepit castle in Germany at the end of WWII has become home to several widows and their children. After her husband’s execution, Marianne von Lingenfels and her three children have returned to Burg Lingenfels, the formerly grand home of his ancestors. His involvement in a failed plot to assassinate Hitler has left her a widow on a mission. Prior to the attack, she made a promise that if something were to go wrong, she would protect the other conspirator’s wives: fellow resistance widows. She rescues Benita and her son Martin, as well as Ania and her two young boys. The lives of these women and their children quickly become intertwined in the aftermath of war as they discover each other’s pasts and look toward the future, a future unlike anything they had previously imagined.
I’ve got to start by applauding Jessica Shattuck for her beautiful writing and meticulous research. She brought so much to life in these pages: the fear and uncertainty, the horrors of war, events like “Kristallnacht,” and of course the pinnacle of the story: an assassination attempt on Hitler by a band of resistors.
The story is told with frequent flashbacks, unraveling the past stories of the three women, their husbands, and the children. Much of the story is set in the castle in 1945 after the deaths of their husbands, but I also appreciated the back stories. I wanted to know how they got there, what their lives were like before the complete chaos and devastation took over their homes and lives. You see that, at once, they were ordinary women and ordinary families who were thrust into horrifying situations, propelling them to become exceptional. My admiration continued to grow.
The story could be slow moving at times, but I credit that to my lack of knowledge grounded in history; I frequently had to put down the book so that I could look up a term (many of which were German) or particular event. Though I have long been interested in WWII, particularly the Holocaust, I am not as versed in specifics as I’d like to be. I have made it a personal mission to become better informed about this time period, as it’s the time period I am most interested in learning about when it comes to history. I have several books on the topic and this novel definitely pushed me to want to pick those up ASAP so that I can truly come to understand the devastation of WWII – and this book was another great addition to that learning for me. I never knew much about resistors at all, and this was a fine introduction. I found that pushing through the slower paced parts was well worth it.
Fans of WWII and historical fiction will enjoy this one quite a bit for its unique take on the war. Strong characters add a lot of value to the story, and beautiful writing helps bring their stories to life.
An old and decrepit castle in Germany at the end of WWII has become home to several widows and their children. After her husband’s execution, Marianne von Lingenfels and her three children have returned to Burg Lingenfels, the formerly grand home of his ancestors. His involvement in a failed plot to assassinate Hitler has left her a widow on a mission. Prior to the attack, she made a promise that if something were to go wrong, she would protect the other conspirator’s wives: fellow resistance widows. She rescues Benita and her son Martin, as well as Ania and her two young boys. The lives of these women and their children quickly become intertwined in the aftermath of war as they discover each other’s pasts and look toward the future, a future unlike anything they had previously imagined.
I’ve got to start by applauding Jessica Shattuck for her beautiful writing and meticulous research. She brought so much to life in these pages: the fear and uncertainty, the horrors of war, events like “Kristallnacht,” and of course the pinnacle of the story: an assassination attempt on Hitler by a band of resistors.
The story is told with frequent flashbacks, unraveling the past stories of the three women, their husbands, and the children. Much of the story is set in the castle in 1945 after the deaths of their husbands, but I also appreciated the back stories. I wanted to know how they got there, what their lives were like before the complete chaos and devastation took over their homes and lives. You see that, at once, they were ordinary women and ordinary families who were thrust into horrifying situations, propelling them to become exceptional. My admiration continued to grow.
The story could be slow moving at times, but I credit that to my lack of knowledge grounded in history; I frequently had to put down the book so that I could look up a term (many of which were German) or particular event. Though I have long been interested in WWII, particularly the Holocaust, I am not as versed in specifics as I’d like to be. I have made it a personal mission to become better informed about this time period, as it’s the time period I am most interested in learning about when it comes to history. I have several books on the topic and this novel definitely pushed me to want to pick those up ASAP so that I can truly come to understand the devastation of WWII – and this book was another great addition to that learning for me. I never knew much about resistors at all, and this was a fine introduction. I found that pushing through the slower paced parts was well worth it.
Fans of WWII and historical fiction will enjoy this one quite a bit for its unique take on the war. Strong characters add a lot of value to the story, and beautiful writing helps bring their stories to life.
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Child death, Death, Genocide, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Police brutality, Antisemitism, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder
Moderate: War
Minor: Vomit, Pregnancy
emotional
informative
sad
medium-paced
challenging
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Gave it two stars because the audiobook narrator was great. This book did nothing for me. Maybe it's because I just finished All the Light We Cannot See, but while I can appreciate what this book was trying to do, the execution of its purpose was...not great. This is not a book for This Particular Moment in history. I'm not really interested in reading about people who committed atrocities but were Actually Good People, who just fell for Nazi propaganda. I'm not interested in that gray area right now, especially when the nuance isn't fleshed out very well.
The story started out strong, but quickly petered out. There was no real connection between the three main female characters. Their motivations and personalities were never fully developed, and none of them were likable. The author grasped at making the reader understand how average citizens were duped into following Hitler but she never quite succeeded. In addition, the use of different timelines is not well done. Some of the characters get flashbacks that are supposed to help develop their characters, but it's mostly boring details that don't add much to the plot.